It takes two to tango
by TinkerbellReturns
Summary: AU: Emma Swan is having a hard time coping with the fact Neal Cassidy is getting married, until she decides that marriage is a game she too can play, much to the whole Clan Charming's dismay. In the meantime, Neal is busy handling wedding preparations while at the same time coping with very conflicted feelings about his future, and his past.
1. 1 Wedding Bells

**_Disclaimer: Borrowed a few lines from Monty Python's Dead Parrot when Neal is thinking about his relationship with Emma. And no, I don't own Emma Swan or Neal Cassidy; if I did, they would be in Tallahassee having… fun._**

* * *

**_A/N: So here I am, basking in all the SwanFire glory from Manhattan, when in comes Tamara and I see my girl Swan's heart break. Do I like love triangles? NO! As a result, this plot bunny won't leave me alone and I decided to have it posted before completing Ashes. _**

**_I dedicate this to any SwanFire fans whose hearts cracked a little last Sunday, lol. As they say, laughter is the best medicine, so here is how I'm treating myself. Meant to be a 3, maybe 4-chapter joke and very OOC, so if that's not your cup of tea, don't drink it, and it won't leave a bad taste in your mouth!_**

* * *

**_Chapter 1: Wedding bells_**

Emma Swan swallowed the last spoon of ice cream with relative indifference. So Neal was going to get married. _Big deal._

May he be happy with that cute, lovely, brown sugar, kind-hearted-to-the-point-of-lending-her-car-to-him-under-very-suspicious-circumstances fiancé of his, Tamara. _Even her name was fancy_. Pfffff. Little did she know what kind of bastard she would be stuck with for the rest of her life.

She shrugged, and then threw the empty tub of chocolate gelato against the wall in a fit of rage.

_'Enough drama,'_ her inner self had boldly determined. _'Life goes on.'_

She picked up the phone, and dialed a number she had called only once, a long time ago.

"Hey Archie, this is Emma," she said, looking at her nails. "Would you join me for a drink? I need someone to talk to."

* * *

"And this is the decoration for the cake I had told you about, Tamara," whispered Regina Mills, the wedding-planner, as she placed a gigantic poster of a five-tier wedding cake decorated with ribbons, flowers and pearls before the eyes of the couple sitting opposite her.

"And how much is that gonna cost me?" asked Neal, as he rubbed his fiancé's back and stared at the poster, and all the other pictures that had been spread on the table. He hoped Tamara would actually invite enough of her friends and family for the gigantic party they were about to throw. As Regina showed him an outrageous four-digit number on a piece of paper, he particularly hoped the guests would make sure to eat those five tiers of cake to its last crumb.

"We have excellent payment plans," the woman hissed, and Neal could swear she felt some kind of sadistic pleasure in seeing him sink further into debt.

"We can have something smaller, sweetie," he heard Tamara whisper. "I don't mind."

Oh, _she was such a doll._ So kind and understanding! Definitely a woman any man would die to marry. And she was pretty as well. What else could Neal hope for?

His run in with Emma Swan had disturbed him a little, he had to admit. But they were over. Past tense. Have-beens. Their romance was no more. It had ceased to be. It had expired and gone to meet its maker. It had kicked the bucket, shuffled off its mortal coil, run down the curtain and joined the choir invisible. Everything was past: their glorious days shoplifting, hot wiring cars, making out in motel rooms before housekeeping, dreamcatchers, yellow bugs, Tallahassee, her cute smile, her warm kisses, their plans, her voice, her eyes…

"Neal?"

Tamara's voice made him jump.

"No!" he replied. "Of course not, honey, we are going to have a wonderful, _wonderful_ wedding party, and I… I _love_ that five-tier cake," he replied, as he took his checkbook out of his pocket.

* * *

"So how did it go?" asked August, who had been waiting for Neal outside, and walked towards him when the couple went their separate ways.

"More digits…" Neal mumbled. "I swear, I'll have to sell a kidney if this keeps going."

"You wait until the kids come," the other man said. "And you start saving for college. That's, my friend, _that's_ when you will need to sell a kidney. Maybe both. And your corneas."

"Yeah, the kids, right?" Neal's voice had reached a strangely high pitch. "The kids!"

"You ok?" August asked, frowning. "You're all sweaty!"

"Oh, no, I'm fine…" _Having kids with Tamara._ Of course! Such a natural thing to do. Why was he panicking? "I'm aaaahshhhiiiaaaaiddaaaghaa…" he muttered incoherently, as he kicked and punched the parking meter in front of him in a fit of rage. "…ggaaaahhh!"

He then stopped, took a deep breath, smoothed his shirt, and looked at August as if nothing had happened.

"I'm fine. Never been better."


	2. 2 Of announcements and wedding vows

**_A/N: Wow, thank you guys for all the great response to Tango. I'm glad you're having fun! I have to say that writing Rumplestiltskin in this fic has been a joy, and you will soon realize why. I can hardly wait to post the next two chapters, in which he is going to make Neal's life even more complicated than it already is, by offering unsolicited advice on his relationship with Tamara. Oh yeah, of course that he will be a hardcore SwanFire fan, could it be any different? Lol. I'm off to update Ashes now, but will wait a little so that I can get the humor off my system because over there, things are getting SERIOUS. Spoiler: someone will depart from the realm of the living. *wipes tears away*_**

* * *

**_Chapter 2: Of announcements and wedding vows_**

"I'm glad you don't think I'm crazy after our talk in the bar yesterday," Emma told Archie Hopper, when he pulled a chair and joined her for lunch.

"Crazy is a very strong word, Emma," he said, as he placed his umbrella near the wall. "We all have our problems."

"So, did you think about it?" she asked, quietly.

"I couldn't actually _stop thinking_ about it," he replied, letting out a sigh. "It was probably the… _most surprising_ thing I have heard in a long time." He had thought of using the word "craziest", but then he would be contradicting himself. "And trust me, I've had my share of surprises in this career."

"So?"

"Emma..." he rubbed his temples nervously. "Your arguments are perfectly logical, but they are all backed up by some huge emotional damage, you do realize that, don't you?"

She rolled her eyes, and leaned back on her chair.

"Marriage…" he continued. "Marriage is a very serious thing. What you proposed is…" again, he thought of saying crazy, and this time it almost escaped his lips, "_…wrong_."

"Why?" she asked, and her voice was loaded with frustration. "What is wrong about two grown-ups who get along well, who have…" she thought of saying 'things in common', but that was clearly not the case, "… things to… learn from each other…. What is wrong if they decide to get married?"

"Emma, what does marriage mean to you?"

She swallowed, and raised her eyebrows.

"Stability," she answered, while staring at her fork as if it was a really rare object. "Settling down."

"Nothing else? Aren't you _missing something?_"

She knew exactly what he was getting at, and there was no way she would go down that road.

"Look, Archie," she said, finally looking at him again. "I just want to find some peace of mind. I want Henry to have a solid, harmonious home, and he needs a father figure. He likes you so much, and-"

"Emma…"

"What?"

"Henry _does have_ a father."

"Now he does," she whispered. "But soon he _will not._"

There was a moment of silence in which Archie's heart had skipped a beat.

_'Oh no!'_ he thought, in a panic. _'Please don't ask me to help you murder him!'_

"Now it's all exciting, it's all a surprise, they're all bubbly over each other. But soon Neal and… _his wife_ will have their own kids… Maybe they'll move out, God knows where they'll go…. And before Henry knows he'll be seeing his father once every month… And then on Thanksgiving and Christmas… Until the day he no longer gets invited," her eyes were vacant as she spoke. "This is what will happen, and I don't want him to suffer anymore."

"Emma, there is _no way_ you can know for sure that is what will happen," Archie whispered, hugely relieved with the fact assassination was not in her mind._ Yet..._

"Oh, trust me, I know. I know _him._"

"Exactly, you know him, and you know what has happened to the two of you. You're projecting your own miser-"

"I thought we had gone through that yesterday."

"We have, but I still think you're missing the po-"

"Don't you feel lonely?" she interrupted again. "Don't you wish you had someone to be there for you, a family?"

"I don't think that mat-"

"_Don't you?_"

"Well…" he said, although he would soon wish he hadn't. "Maybe I do, bu-"

"You'll join us for dinner, then?"

He sighed. _Water dripping day by day…_

"I will," he answered at last, and immediately knew that the smile on Emma Swan's face meant he had just dug his own grave.

* * *

"Son, we have to talk."

Neal had dropped by Tamara's place to pick her up for their wedding ceremony rehearsal, and was fixing his hair and whistling carelessly when his father entered the bathroom, as if that was the most common thing to do.

"You know, when a door is closed, people usually knock," he said, without looking at the old man. "_Especially_ if it is a bathroom door."

"Oh, really?" the other man replied, with a sneer. "And I wonder what kind of privacy you intend to keep? Do you know how many of _your diapers_ I changed?"

Neal's shoulders slumped in defeat, as he put his hands over the sink and took a long, deep breath. _'There he goes again…'_ he thought, while preparing for one of their daily moments of insanity. Much to his bad luck, even after they were able to find an antidote to the poison on his father's injury after he was attacked by Hook, some of it seemed to have damaged his brain and now he kept acting… _weird._

"Anyway…" Rumplestilstkin continued, as he picked up a pair of sunglasses from his pocket and put them on, elbowing Neal out of the way so that he could look at himself in the mirror. "I just want to tell you that I don't trust that wedding-planner of yours, Regina Mills," he said, as he too fixed his hair. "My advice? _Stay away from her. _There is something fishy about that company of hers, 'Happy Endings'. I bet it is a front for some dirty business."

"Oh, really?" Neal muttered, as he looked at his father's outfit. The man was clearly going cuckoo. "Well, I'll take your advice when you start dressing like a normal person again."

"What is wrong with my clothes?" Rumplestiltskin asked his son, throwing him a dirty look from under the shades.

"Really?" Neal whispered, staring at his father in disbelief. "You _really _see nothing wrong?"

The other man looked at his purple shirt, leather pants, pointed-toe silver boots, and then spoke.

"I think the boots are very stylish, if that's what you meant."

"It's not your boots," Neal answered, as he made to leave the bathroom. "You're wearing your underwear _over your pants_."

"What?" he heard the man blurt out behind him. "No I'm n…_oh, bollocks!_"

Neal simply shook his head, bracing himself for another very long day.

* * *

At the Charmings, Archie Hopper was starting to think that maybe joining Emma, her parents and Henry for dinner had not been such a bad idea, after all. The food was absolutely delicious, and they were all engaging in very light conversation.

Until the moment Emma cleared her throat by his side.

"Mom… Dad… _Henry…_" she said, with a strangely composed voice as she smiled. "Archie and I have an announcement to make."

_'Oh dear,'_ it was all he had time to think before the blonde went on.

"We are getting married!" she exclaimed, lifting her shoulders in excitement. "Yay!"

Only then did he realize that his last bite of roast turkey was now sliding towards his lungs, and he choked profusely.

Across from him, Henry's jaw had dropped so much it almost touched the puddle of gravy on his plate, and Snow had frozen midair as she held a huge spoon of smashed potatoes that were now dripping to the tablecloth.

"Well, you have my blessing," said Charming, the only one who didn't seem shocked at all as he munched on his corn. The man was actually beaming; after the whole entanglement with Rumplestiltskin's son, what a joy it was to hear that his girl was getting married to such a decent, _harmless_ man!

"Charming!" shrieked Snow, who had woken from the trance.

"What?" he asked with a frown. "Archie is a great man!"

"That is not the point," she hissed, before standing up. "Emma, a word?"

She waited until her daughter had followed her into the kitchen to start talking again.

"What are you doing?"

"What do you mean?" Emma asked, as she tucked her hands into her pockets. "I just think it's time to settle down, that's all."

"With _Archie?_"

"What about him?"

"You don't love him."

"I don't need to," Emma replied, pursing her lips. "We're just getting married."

"Wh-yo-th-wh-Emma!" Snow stuttered. "Listen to yourself!"

"I am listening," Emma shrugged. "And I'm still getting married."

Snow clenched her jaw, knowing she was fighting a losing battle.

"When?" she asked.

"Saturday."

"_Saturday?_" Snow's eyes were about to pop from her head. "Emma, that is two days from now!"

"Yup," the other woman replied, still with an evident I-don't-give-a-damn look in her face. "That was the only time slot Mother Superior had available. Either that or only next year."

"Emma, I beg you, please,_ please…_" Snow had clasped her hands together and was about to go down on her knees. "Please don't go through with this insane idea!"

"Sorry to let you down," Emma answered, from a very cozy place inside her armored heart. "But _I will._"

* * *

"Mr. Cassidy!" Regina Mills yelled, and not for the first time that day. "May I remind you that your wedding will take place in less than a month, and that I would have expected you to have memorized your vows by now, instead of having to read them from a _lousy piece of paper?_"

Neal was sweating profusely, as all eyes fell on him. He had screwed up again, but what could they expect? He just couldn't retain all that information in his brain, and to make matters worse, instead of bringing his vows in 'a lousy piece of paper', as the wedding-planner made sure to constantly remind him, he had found out that what he had actually shoved in his pocket before leaving Tamara's house was her shopping list. As a result, every time his eyes ran over words like 'pineapple' and 'two gallons of milk', he would instantly forget whatever sentence his mind was trying to come up with, and the whole rehearsal would come to a halt.

"Are we done?" asked a very cranky Rumplestiltskin, who kept looking at Regina with a suspicious gleam on his eyes. "If he hasn't got it right after the 12 times he's tried, maybe it is a sign from heavens we should call it a day."

"_I_ get to choose when we call it a day,_ sir,_" Regina replied, glaring daggers at him. "Again," she said, turning to look at Neal with utter contempt in her eyes.

"It's pointless," he muttered. "I just can't do it."

"Why don't we move on to the dinner rehearsal, then?" Tamara had approached her fiancé and placed a hand over his, with a comforting smile on her face.

Neal felt incredibly guilty, and not only because he couldn't memorize his wedding vows.


	3. 3 Make me forget

**Disclaimer: I own nothing, but I can laugh, so I will. Feel free to join me!**

**A/N: Here is Chapter 3, a very,VERY long one, in which Emma decides to head to a pub to drown her sorrows while Neal chooses to stay sober, and both end up having a night to forget. Warning! If you think Hook/Emma and Neal/Tamara getting… ****_intimate _****will traumatize you, do not proceed! However, if you feel you can handle it, hang around and you might be in for a laugh! Bowls of soup, broken legs and radiators: I salute you all, fellow Oncers, and thank you for all your reviews, follows and suggestions! Meresger, I think you will be particularly pleased with this one, since two of your suggestions are in it! Cheers to you all, and enjoy!**

* * *

**Chapter 3: Make me forget**

"Why are you waxing the bug again?" asked Henry, as he approached a very obstinate Emma Swan.

"I don't think I did it right the last time," she answered, with a feverish look in her eyes.

"Right…" the boy responded, wondering whether or not he should say that she had said exactly the same thing the last few times she had waxed the bug.

"Hey, kid, do me a favor," she said, wiping the sweat off her forehead. "Can you check the glove compartment and get all the papers out, if there are any?"

He nodded, and got into the car that was now ridiculously shiny, both on the inside and on the outside. He then reappeared by her side, holding a couple of envelopes, receipts and a few other crumpled pieces of paper.

"Let me see…" she whispered, shuffling through bills, restaurant leaflets and other insignificant business cards. "Can you please throw these away? I'll need this… and this…" she pocketed what looked like documents and one or another bill, and then unfolded an old-looking piece of paper, that she didn't take long to recognize.

"What is it?" Henry asked, seeing her eyes had grown wide, and that she looked scared.

"Nothing," she said hurriedly, crumpling the piece of paper and handing it to Henry. "You can throw that away as well."

"Is that all?"

"Yup, looks like it," Emma said, putting her hands on her waist.

The boy looked at the bug and whistled, impressed at his mother's work.

"It looks like new!"

"That is the idea," Emma answered, with a vacant look in her eyes. "I'm having it sold."

"What?" Henry blurted out. "You can't sell it, that is where you met my dad, isn't it?"

_'Thanks Neal, for telling the kid that story,'_ she thought, biting back the urge to call him names.

"Henry," she touched the boy in the shoulder and shook her head, with her lips tightly shut for a moment before speaking again. "It's just a car."

She then walked away, craving a beer or something stronger. Yeah, _definitely something stronger,_ something that would knock her out for the rest of the afternoon, and the evening, and maybe the next morning as well.

Behind her, Henry unfolded the crumpled paper his mother had given him and put it in his pocket after making sure no one was watching, after glancing at it with noted interest.

* * *

It was late already.

_'I wonder what time it is…'_ Neal wondered, without really wanting to know, as he morosely dipped his hands into the warm water in the kitchen sink, and grabbed a dish he had already washed at least four times.

He washed it again, and put it back inside the sink, so that he could repeat that cycle _ad infinitum_, much to the disgrace of his hands, that were now all red and painfully wrinkled.

_'Look at you…'_ whispered a voice inside his head. _'The newest househusband of Storybrooke…'_

His shoulders slumped, as he quickly reviewed the latest events in his life: stranded in Storybrooke with a deluded father and his fiancée, playing his part in the whole farce the townsfolk had been engaged in ever since the barriers around the picturesque fairish town ceased to protect it from the curious eyes of regular people. Their only hope to bring things back to normality – that is, Fairytale characters on one square; common, mundane citizens carefully put in another - was Rumplestiltskin. Alas, the old man had lost his… _evil edge,_ so to speak, after Hook attacked him in a fit of rage, and now nobody knew what to do.

He didn't, either, but being the man's son granted him a few benefits, and the biggest of them was being in charge of looking after him.

He snorted. If that was not lucky, he wondered what was.

There was no way he could simply move into town without letting Tamara know, and so he did. He told her they would have to be away from each other for some time, at least until his father got better. And what had she done? Offered to go with him and help. She would even find them a nice, cozy place to live in the meantime so that they could all hang on together.

_'Oh, Tamara!'_ his mind howled, in despair. _'Why do you have to be such a lovely person?'_

Neal mentally slapped himself for feeling sorry for his fiancée being a nice person. What was that supposed to mean, anyway? Of course she was a wonderful person; that was why he had fallen in love with her, to begin with.

The wicked voice inside his head burst into laughter.

"Stop it!" Neal exclaimed, barely noticing that he was talking to himself. No, not talking. _Screaming._ He seemed to be screaming a lot those days… Perhaps he should start taking something to calm his nerves.

* * *

Snow White was worried. It was half past ten and her daughter hadn't yet come back home after leaving for a drink, "to blow off some steam".

_'She's not a teenager anymore, you know?'_ her good sense was quick to remind her.

Oh, she knew that. Her daughter was fully grown, a mother herself. But then, she also knew that the combination of alcohol and heartbreak never ended well. _She had learned from experience._

"Oh, Emma!" she muttered, fearing it would be too late when she finally arrived at the local pub.

Apparently, she was just in time.

Emma Swan was dancing over one of the tables, trying uselessly not to spill her fifth margarita as she rocked her body back and forth, drawing very amused looks from the people around.

_'Not a good dancer… just like her father,'_ Snow told herself, shaking her head. "Emma," she said at last, approaching her frenzied daughter. "Emma!"

After screaming her name for the third time, Snow's voice finally registered in Emma's foggy brain.

"Mom?" she asked, spilling half of her drink over someone's head as she tried to steady herself on the table. "What you doing here?"

She hiccupped, and Snow outstretched her hand so that she could graciously descend from her improvised stage.

Ok. Maybe _not so graciously._

With a little help from the same man who had just been showered with tequila and Cointreau, and didn't seem to be worried about it in the slightest, she had finally managed to lower Emma onto a chair.

"Oh mom…" the woman bawled, as she let her head fall onto the table. "I miss him soooo muuuch!"

Snow reached out for her daughter's hand, trying to comfort her with a warm smile. Love hurt, she knew it. It was a blessing that Emma was finally letting it all out.

"He was SO good in bed!" Emma howled.

And then she realized that maybe it was not _that_ much of a blessing.

"His hands! Oh, his hands!" Emma's head had shot up, and her eyes were burning with more than alcoholic grogginess. "The things he could do with _those hands..._"

"Emma, please…" Snow whispered, feeling Emma was about to embarrass herself by telling her mother things that she would never dream of telling if she were sober. "Please, I don't need to know."

"You know, one day," Emma shifted on her chair and closed her eyes, but kept speaking. "One day we were robbing this fancy store in Portland, and he dragged me to the back office and-"

"Emma, please, _please don't_," Snow was now shaking her daughter's arms, in an attempt to bring her back to her senses.

And then, proving that the blood-to-alcohol ratio in her blood stream was slightly in favor of the tequila, Emma burst into tears.

"Why are you talking to me like that?" she sobbed.

_'Oh, the joys of parenthood,'_ Snow thought, as she rolled her eyes at her daughter's meltdown.

"Emma, let's just go home. I'll make some coffee, get you under the shower, and you will feel better."

"No," Emma replied, and all the crying was quickly replaced by her usual stubbornness.

"Emma…"

"I want to enjoy my last night as a single woman," she replied, and since it was Thursday, and not Friday, it was fair to conclude the alcohol had affected her temporal references as well.

"This hardly qualifies as 'enjoyable', don't you think?" Snow asked, looking around and then back at her daughter's face.

"No."

Snow was not surprised. She knew her daughter too well for her own good, and she had really hoped she wouldn't need to resort to that final argument, since it was borderline blackmail… but desperate times called for drastic measures.

"Emma," she said, looking deeply into the other woman's eyes. "What am I going to tell Henry when he asks me where his mother is?"

Emma's eyes fluttered closed in a very funny display of angry drunkenness.

"You are such a kill joy," she whispered, getting to her feet rather clumsily, and staggering towards the door.

* * *

"Do you always have a drink…" asked Rumplestiltskin, as he cast a sideways look to his son grabbing a bottle of gin from behind the bar counter, "…before going to bed with your fiancée?"

Neal had tried to ignore his father's presence in the living room as he fixed himself a drink, but that comment was far too caustic to go unanswered. Just as the gin in his glass was about to touch his lips and indulge his senses in its bitter glory, he stopped, and eyed his father with indignation.

"Excuse me?" he said, putting down his glass and knowing that had been the invitation for one of their epic verbal duels.

However, his father was having none of it. _Oh, no._ He danced to his own tune, so instead of coming up with some sort of acid comeback, as his son would expect, he simply fumbled in the paper bag he was carrying and started pulling out ashtrays from inside it. His only reaction to Neal's words was a very sarcastic snicker.

Then, he spoke.

"From someone who has been married, let me tell you this," he said, looking at the ashtrays with a sneer on his lips. "It only gets worse."

Neal felt his grip around the glass had tightened so much that it would crack at any given moment.

"Oh, I see," he said, trying as hard as he could to remain calm and composed. "You and that ridiculous assumption that I don't love Tamara, again."

Another impish snicker.

_'One more of those,'_ Neal thought, and his nostrils flared, _'and this glass will soon be flying towards your head!'_

"Son, when you get to be my age, you'll realize you don't have time for _assumptions,_" he said, with unsettling tranquility. "Either you know it," he continued, giving him one of those hand flourishes that he hated so much, _"…or you don't."_

And then, he had the audacity to snicker again, as if challenging his son to go through with his threat.

"And if there is one thing that _I know_," he moved towards Neal, raising a finger as he spoke, "is that you're not over that Hannah girl yet."

"Hannah?" Neal asked, with nothing but indifference showing on his face. He wouldn't let the other man know how much he made him mad; that would be succumbing to his endless taunts. _He wouldn't let him win._

"Yes."

"Her name is _Emma,_" Neal hissed, keeping eye contact as he too moved one step forward.

"Precisely," Rumplestiltskin replied, clasping his hands in another theatrical performance. "Now, gulp down that gin and go give your ebony princess some loving," he continued, and Neal felt the urge to strangle the man before him. "Just make sure not to call her _Emma,_" the man whispered in his son's ear, before walking past him. "Or Hannah. Or Emma. Bloody hell, I'm confused now," Rumplestiltskin stopped on his tracks before reaching the door to the guest room where he was staying. "What is the right name?"

Neal bared his teeth and lowered the glass onto the counter with so much violence the gin jumped from its container to his chest. _How dared him!_

He felt blood rise to his ears, and before he knew it, he was marching towards Tamara's bedroom with a feverish look in his eyes.

He would prove that old lunatic wrong, and it would be _now._

* * *

Snow and her daughter had almost reached their house when Emma stopped dead on her tracks.

"Oh no," she said. "I left my jacket in the pub!"

"We can get it back tomorrow," Snow replied, wishing nothing but a warm, soothing bath to take away the stench of cigarette smoke and alcohol that stuck to her hair.

"No, I can't," Emma whimpered. "The keys to the bug are in it!"

Snow rolled her eyes, and forced herself to turn on her heels and face her daughter.

"I'll go get it, you don't have to come," Emma said, and tried to straighten her back in an attempt not to look so drunk. "I'll be home in five, I promise," she quickly added, after realizing her mother had tilted her head and was looking at her with nothing but suspicion.

She bid her mother a quick goodbye, and forced herself to walk in a straight line so that the other woman wouldn't change her mind about giving her that vow of trust. When she finally got back to the pub, she realized she had no idea as to where the jacket could be, and searching for it in her current state of mind would be a hell of a task.

_'Womanizer, Woman, Womanizer, You're a Womanizer, oh Womanizer oh You're a Womanizer, baby, You you you are, you you you are, Womanizer, Womanizer…'_

She hated those songs that stuck to her head, even when she was completely _wasted_. Soon enough, she was staggering around, humming along the damn song that blared out in the stifling little pub.

"Hey Swan!"

A familiar male voice behind her made her stop. She turned around, and there he was, the eyeliner delight of the seven seas, part of his chest showing from inside his fancy white pirate shirt, his lips curled in that stupid smile, a treacherous siren inviting her to drown in the deep waters of his game.

_'Boy, don't try to front, I know just what you are… Boy, don't try to front, I know just what you are…'_

She smiled as the music went on. _How very fitting!_

"What is it that I hear about you getting married?" he asked, as those ridiculously _hot_ eyes pierced hers. Under any other circumstance, she would walk away from that vile, cold-blooded man and his silly pick- up lines, but tonight was different.

Tonight she was actually glad he came along.

_'You got me goin'…You're oh so charmin'…But I can do it…Womanizer'_

"Don't you tell me you'll tie the knot with Rump-"

Before Hook could finish his sentence, she covered the distance that separated them, and pressed her fingers to his lips.

"You have a really nice mouth, Hook," she whispered, and her eyes never left his. "But it wasn't made for speaking."

With that, she dug her fingers behind his neck and brought his lips to hers.

* * *

Neal had finally reached Tamara's room, and slammed the door open. She was combing her hair, and looked at him with a surprised expression.

"Neal," she asked. "Are you d-"

But he had already moved towards her and pressed his mouth over hers, lifting her hips to the dresser and wiping all her cosmetics to the floor as he wrapped her legs around his waist.

"Neal!" she gasped, as he broke the kiss to pull his shirt over his head and resumed kissing her neck savagely as he slid down her pajama bottoms.

"Oh, Tamara," he whispered, completely sober, without a single drop of alcohol on his blood stream. "I love your skin…!"

"I love your skin, too," she purred, as her nails dug into his back.

He lifted her from the dresser and laid her in the bed, his mouth searching hers desperately as he fumbled with the buttons of his jeans.

"Your smell drives me crazy!" he roared, as he kicked away his pants and helped her out of her top, and then proceeded to scrape his teeth across her neck. _"Crazy!"_

He felt her hands moving down his hips, and looked down to find out, much to his dismay, that nothing was happening _down there_.

She seemed to realize his hesitation, and was quick to reassure him.

"It's okay, sweetie," she moaned. "Sometimes it takes time, just relax."

He swallowed, and blushed violently at his predicament.

"Here," realizing his morale was deflating way too fast, Tamara shifted her body so that she was on top, straddling him. "Close your eyes."

And he did. He felt her hands rubbing his chest, and a wonderful feeling spread across his body. Her hands were so soft… and warm…

"See, that's what I'm talking about," she purred, and he opened his eyes to see her blond hair falling over her naked shoulders, as her blue eyes bore into his, and she smiled… just like she did that day at the motel where they had gotten the dreamcatcher. "All you had to do was relax."

He let out a cry as he pushed Emma Swan out of his mind, and lap.

"Holy Moses!"

Tamara tumbled to the ground as he too jumped out of bed, in a haze.

"I'm gonna _kill_ him!" he hissed between gritted teeth.

"Neal?" his fiancée was clearly startled, but that was not enough to stop him as he left her bedroom wearing nothing but his boxers.

"This is your fault!" he yelled, after blasting into the guest room where his father was entertaining himself piling up ashtrays over his bedside table. "_Your_ fault! Now give it back!"

"My fault?" Rumplestiltskin whispered, with a smile curling his lips. "Oh my, give you back _what?_ You're not making any sense, son."

"You know exactly what I'm talking about!" he screamed, completely flustered as he pointed an accusing finger at his father's amused face. _"You're not over the Emma girl…"_ he mocked his voice, flourishing his hands around just like his father did. _"Go get yourself drunk to sleep with your fiancée!"_ He then let his arms fall to his side. "What did you say those things for?"

"Oh, I see now!" his father answered, approaching him and trying hard to stifle a giggle. "You want your peace of mind back!"

_Damn the old man for knowing him so well._

"I'm sorry, son," he continued, still smiling as he went back to his new-found hobby. "The only thing I have to give you is…" he raised one of the ashtrays, "…a bowl of soup."

Neal's eye twitched. He shouldn't let his father's insanity get to him. Not now, anyway, when he had other things to worry about. He should not reply. He should just walk away.

_If only he could._

"That is NOT a bowl a soup, it's an ashtray," he hissed, fully aware he was about to be dragged into some sort of nonsensical dialogue.

"It is a bowl of soup," the other man answered, looking startled at Neal's angry face.

"It isn't!"

"It isn't _what?_" now Rumplestiltskin looked deeply confused as he put down the astray.

"A bowl of soup!" Neal snarled.

"You!" his father snapped back, getting to his feet. "YOU are a bowl of soup!"

"No, YOU are a bowl of soup!"

_That was it._ He was officially as deranged as his old man, screaming about bowls of soup wearing nothing but boxers, in the middle of the night.

"What is going on?" Tamara had stopped by the door, with a concerned look on her face.

Neal simply marched past her and headed to the other room in order to pick up his clothes.

"I'm going out to meet August," he said in a hurry, as he searched for his shirt. "I'm okay, really, I just need to get some air."

He then gave her a quick kiss on the cheek and left.

* * *

"Took you long enough, Swan," Hook moaned, as Emma finally unglued her mouth from his and now aimed at other parts of his body.

He grabbed a fistful of her hair as she wrapped one of her legs around his waist, with her eyes closed. _What a beautiful sight._ Of course, there were times when he could make out the words _'your hands_' in her indistinct drunken rambling, and that would throw him off for a brief second. After all, the plural made it quite clear it wasn't _him_ she was referring to.

_'Well, one can't have it all,'_ he thought. He was in no position to complain, really. Whoever the man in her mind was, truth was that at least _her body_ was his for the night, and he would not look a gift horse in the mouth.

"Oh, Swan, you're such a naughty girl…" he moaned again, and the woman giggled, still lost in her own universe. '_Yeah, you are a naughty, steamy hot blonde who deserves some serious spanking…'_ his mind dribbled away. Obviously, he was not about to try his luck anytime soon, not in the middle of a crowded pub. He knew that the only reason why someone hadn't called the sheriff yet to stop what they were doing was because… well, because the sheriff herself was one of the people involved.

_ 'If only we were in my ship…'_

And then, he paused.

Maybe the reason she was not concentrating on him was the environment, as well. What if he dragged her into _his _domain? Would she still find it in her to think of anyone or anything else _but him?_

He smiled.

"Swan…" he whispered in her ear, before nipping at it. "What do you say we continue this somewhere more… _private?_"

The woman had finally opened her eyes, and apparently was trying to get herself to focus on his face. Then, without a word, she grabbed his hand and dragged him towards the door.

Emma Swan could barely acknowledge where they were heading, though, and she didn't care. She was treating herself to some hot pirate action and she was not about to be stopped anytime soon.

"Hey Swan," she heard Hook shout, and a trail of female giggling seemed to be beside him. "Do you mind if we take these beauties with us?"

She snapped her head back, only to find out Hook had gotten his free arm around the necks of a gorgeous brunette and a redhead, who was holding hands with another slender girl.

"You know… the more, _the merrier,_" he said, staring at her with a lecherous look in his eyes.

She let go of his hand, and lifted an eyebrow after realizing he was standing at the edge of a particularly steep staircase.

_Tough luck._

"You dirty… PIG!" she yelled, lowering her fists on his chest with all the strength she could muster. It was not that much of a blow, but given the fact the pirate had had his share of alcohol as well, he easily stumbled to the side and was soon rolling down the stairs like a rag doll.

"And you…" she clumsily turned to look at the women, who looked positively shocked with her behavior. Emma then flung her arms forward, as if trying to scare away a crow that had just entered her kitchen. "Shoo… shoo… Party is over, get out!"

She waited until the women were gone to go down the stairs herself, moving slowly but surely towards the man at the far end below.

She was _so not done_ with him yet.

* * *

"You called me here in the middle of the night, because you _couldn't get an erection?_" asked August, looking at the man who had just stopped talking by his side with an utter expression of disbelief.

Neal hid his face on his folded arms over the pub counter, and then moved one of his hands to cover his mouth as he looked around, completely mortified at August's words.

"Oh, yeah, I don't think that lady in the back heard you," Neal hissed. "Why don't you say it _louder?_"

"Honestly, my friend," the other man replied, as he took another sip of his drink, shaking his head. "Your voice on the phone was of a man at the gates of death! If I had known the matter was so… _trivial,_" he threw Neal an entertained look, "I would have told you to wait until the morning!"

"It is not trivial!" Neal barked back.

"It happens to everyone," August answered in a matter-of-fact way. "Don't beat yourself up."

"This time was different!" the other man said, only to realize a second later that the sentence he had just uttered revealed previous unsuccessful endeavors. He blushed, but now that the cat was out of the bag, he could at least explain what he meant. "This time, I actually _saw someone else_ while I was trying to, and actually succeeding, in… in… you know…"

"Getting an erection," August completed, and Neal winced again.

"Can you stop using that word, for fuck's sake?"

"Ok," August said, as he struggled to stifle his laughter. "A boner it is, then."

"Oh, please," Neal shifted uncomfortably in the pub stool, looking more frustrated than ever.

"Ok, I'm sorry, I'm sorry," the other man replied, as laughter slowly made its way out of his chest. "Ok. _Ok. _So, who did you see?"

"I think you know exactly who I saw," Neal replied, in a whisper.

When August looked at his face, he saw that the man had his trademark puppy look on, and it gave him pause. _What was he getting at?_

"Do I?" he muttered, confusion spreading all over his face.

"You do, August."

Puppy eyes again. August raised his eyebrows, feeling slightly uncomfortable with where that conversation seemed to be taking them.

"Now that is confusing," he answered, searching for the right words to say. "Especially now that you are about to get married…"

"I know," Neal replied, and his voice was hoarse and desperate. "And you're the only one who can help me."

_Oh Golly. _

How had he not noticed that in all the time he had known him? What a horrible situation he had gotten himself into, and how was he supposed to make his way out of it? If he told his friend those feelings were not reciprocal, the man would be devastated… But then, the whole thing freaked him out! He had never viewed Baelfire as anything more than a friend. What was he supposed to do?

"Ok," August said, gathering all courage and nerve he had in order to do what he was about to do. "But only because you are my best friend!"

He then gulped down his brandy, and grabbed the other man's face to plant a kiss on his lips.

Neal felt his eyes were forcing his way out of his face as August's lips covered his, and that his own self had fled from his body, horrified at what was going on.

When Self returned, he was finally able to push the other man away.

"What in the name of all fucks do you think you're doing?" he asked at last, hoping he had gotten his message across.

"The only thing I could do after you told me you have been thinking about me!" August said, as shocked as the other man with the developments of that night.

"Are you _insane?_" Neal cried out. "I wasn't talking about you! I was talking about Emma!"

"Oh," August muttered, and it was his turn to blush. "Well then, you might want to watch out for your body language," he blinked, reaching for his empty glass as he spoke, "…because you were sending out all the wrong messages over there."

Neal looked like he was about to have a stroke.

He then rose to his feet, feeling his head was about to burst into flames, and stomped out of the pub.

"Hey!" he heard August shout behind him, but didn't look back. "But I'm still your best man, right? _Right?_"

The cold breeze outside made him feel slightly better, although his head was now pounding violently. Damned be his father for making his life hell! Damned be August for helping! And Emma Swan…

"Why can't I stop thinking about you?" he yelled, as he stood alone in the middle of the sidewalk.

No one answered, luckily. If they did, _and answered it right,_ he would have no alternative but to jump from the nearest bridge after the truth slapped him hard on the face.

_'Enough drama,' _he told himself, as he took a long, deep breath. He had to do something, and he would do it now.

He pulled out his brand new cell phone from one of the back pockets in his jeans, and searched for the woman's number on his contact list.

"Mills?" he said, running a hand over his hair. "We are bringing the wedding forward," he paced the sidewalk nervously. "No, not a week. Not two weeks either. I want it to happen _this Saturday_," he held the phone at an arm's length so that Regina Mills' vicious yells would not deafen him. "Well, I AM paying you to make a miracle, so figure it out! You have less than 48 hours!"

And then he hung up, knowing that his little outburst would eventually come back and bite him in the ass.

* * *

"Where am I?" Emma asked, as she slowly opened her eyes and tried to make sense of her surroundings.

"At the sheriff's station," answered Ruby.

"Oh, I can see that," answered the other woman, trying to ignore the nauseous pounding in her head as she spoke. "But why I am in a cell?"

Ruby bit her lip before speaking.

"I'm sorry, Emma."

"What for?" Emma asked again, closing her eyes so that the light shining above their heads wouldn't make her throw up.

"You see… I had to bring you in, before Hook woke up."

Hearing that name made the bitter taste in her mouth get even worse.

"What about him?"

"You don't remember?" asked Ruby.

"Oh, I remember," she said, as fragments of their moments in the pub flashed before her eyes. "But nothing that would land my ass in prison, I think" Emma replied, feeling less than courteous as the room seemed to spin a little every time she blinked.

"Emma…" Ruby seemed to be choosing her words carefully. "Hook was found unconscious in an alleyway, with a broken leg and one of his arms chained to a radiator!"

The other woman tried not to laugh, and failed.

"Why are you laughing?"

Emma's shoulders shook, and only then did she realize that laughing was actually making her whole body ache. She took a long, deep breath, and prepared to defend her case.

"And what does _that_ have to do with me?" she asked. Oh no, she had too much experience in police stations to go down that easily. If Ruby wanted a confession, she would have to work harder.

"We found you lying on the floor less than ten feet away from him."

"That proves nothing," Emma shrugged, and she applauded herself for being so quick to articulate her defense despite a really bad hangover.

Then, Ruby handed her a picture of a knocked-out Hook, with a very pleased smile on his unconscious face, and the words "Emma Swan's been here" written on his forehead with what looked an awful lot like red lipstick.

Emma raised her eyebrows, but quickly regained confidence.

"Looks like someone has tried to frame me," she responded, folding her arms.

Ruby looked at her with sympathy, and said nothing.

"Oh, for crying out loud," Emma said, throwing her head back and immediately realizing it had been a very bad idea, as she was now having trouble bringing it back up as she clutched the cell bars. "It's Hook! Who cares, anyway?"

"I know that he probably deserved it, but…"

"Come on Ruby, let me out..." Emma whimpered.

"I can't," the other woman winced. "Not until your father gets here."

"You called _my father?_"

"I had to!"

She pressed her forehead against the cell bars. It was not the first time she got arrested, but having her own father bail her out… that would be a first. _A very embarrassing one, _at that.


	4. 4 The day after

_**Disclaimer: These lovely crazy people do not belong to me! Too bad!**_

* * *

_**A/N: And I'm back! After watching the promo for 'Selfless, Brave and True', I realized August needed to sink deeper in the madness of this storyline, so in this chapter he finally gets the call from Crazy Executive Officer Rumplestiltskin. Little does he know that soon enough he will be doing much more than joining his friend's father for suspicious deliveries... In the meantime, Emma runs into someone she was really not willing to see, and Neal has a complicated conversation with his fiancée.**_

* * *

_**Chapter 4: The day after**_

August woke up with a start and looked at his phone as it buzzed again. He had slept over the pub counter.

"Baelfire, I am so sorry," he said, after he recognized the incoming call.

"This is not Baelfire. It's his father."

August's eyes shot open as panic rushed through his veins.

"What do you want?"

"I need you to stop by," Rumplestiltskin replied.

"Why?"

The man on the other side of the line, as usual, would save the explanations for later, and simply hung up.

"Oh, great," August muttered, as he searched around for his jacket and got ready to leave.

* * *

Rumplestiltskin felt particularly proud of himself. The sun had barely risen, and he had already gone out to buy Baelfire something that would lift his spirits. After all, nothing like a little joke to start the day, after a frustrating night with your fiancée.

'_Oh, yes…'_ he thought, as his eyes grew vacant. '_Frustrating nights with ladies… Déjà vu!'_

He then remembered the night a woman he once loved met a certain pirate… The night yet another love of his lost her memory… Then the night another woman told him she was not going with him, and they would never have kids together… If only he could remember exactly who was whom in his muddled recollections! And the right chronological order of such fateful events!

He shook his head, and his gaze shifted to his son, sleeping on the couch, and he had to smile as he pulled up a blanket to cover the man. When he heard a knock on the door, he quickly tiptoed to welcome August in.

"Why is he sleeping on the couch?" he asked, as soon as he entered the house and saw Baelfire's arm hanging limply from one of the sofas.

"Why do you think?" Rumplestiltskin hissed, urging August to lower his voice. "Because he doesn't want to sleep with _her_, that is why."

"Right," August frowned, as memories of his moments with his friend at the pub filled his mind. "So, what do you want?"

"I have bought gifts to my son and his future wife."

"You bought Tamara a gift?"

Now _that_ was a surprise.

"Oh, please, don't be pathetic," Rumplestiltskin snorted. "Of course I didn't."

'_Of course not,' _August thought, trying hard not to roll his eyes at the other man's insanity.

"May I inquire as to who his future wife is, then?" he asked at last, trying to be extremely cautious with his words.

Rumplestiltskin then raised a finger with a mischievous look on his face, and August felt slightly uncomfortable. The man might be off his rocker, but there was still this menacing aura about him that always made him wonder.

"I even wrote it down, so that I would not forget," the older man whispered, as he showed August a little piece of parchment with the name 'Emma' written hundreds of time all over it.

August rubbed his eyes, and stuffed his hands in his pockets. When he opened his eyes again, he took a moment to study Baelfire's sleeping face, all of a sudden feeling terribly sorry for everything the man was likely to be enduring with Rumplestiltskin living under the same roof as him.

"Your son is not getting married to Emma Swan."

"Yes, he is."

"No, he is _not_."

"Young man, let me tell you this," Rumplestiltskin took one step closer to August, and his eyes seemed ablaze when he spoke. "I can see the future, and I'm telling you, _he is._"

'_Crazy, but still creepy,'_ August mentally remarked as he took one step back from the deranged man before him.

"Ok." There was no point in arguing, after all. "What did you want me here for?"

"I need her address."

"Whose address?" August asked, coyly.

Rumplestiltskin only stared at him with a grimace.

"Look, why don't you just give me the present and I'll take it?"

"Because I don't trust you," the older man replied, baring his teeth. "Because, if you ask me, I think you are a petty little liar that _should not be trusted._"

As Rumplestiltskin stressed every single one of those last four words, August had the very clear impression the Dark One was finally recovering his senses and remembering exactly who he was and what people had done to him, including him, Pinocchio.

Talk about a bad time for _that_ to happen.

"F-Fine," he stuttered, feeling slightly relieved when he saw that the fiery look on the man's face had again been replaced by a puzzled gaze. "I'll give you the address, if you tell me what you bought them."

"Well, just take a look at it yourself," Rumplestiltskin replied, with a proud twist of his hands.

August reached out for the first box, and his eyes went wide when he saw its content.

"What?" he whispered, as he picked up a blow-up doll that had been carefully wrapped in red paper. "You can't be serious!"

"Oh, of course I am not serious," Rumplestiltskin replied, rocking back and forth on his heels. "If I were, I would have bought him some common sense, instead."

"Where did you buy this?"

"That girl at the café was holding a garage sale to rid herself of her latest boyfriend's possessions. I thought it was rather creative."

"You're giving your son a _second-hand_ blow-up doll?" August hissed, a little louder than he had expected. "What is wrong with you?"

Neal shifted on the couch, throwing away his blanket and moaning, but still sleeping.

"You're going to wake him up, you blockhead!" Rumplestiltskin whispered, pinching the other man's arm and watching as he made a face. "You know, don't bother giving me the address, let's just go!"

He took the box on the coffee table and then the one on August's hands, hurried to write down a few lines on a card, and left one of the presents on the table for when his son woke up. After that, he grabbed August's arm as silently as he could, and the two of them left the house to deliver the other box.

* * *

Emma Swan carefully avoided her father's eyes as they walked back home. Of all ways to end a bad night!

As a matter of fact, it was now morning, and the sun in her eyes was only making her feel more nauseated, and cold. She shivered, wishing she had actually gotten her jacket back when she returned to the pub, instead of… well, instead of Hook.

Every now and then, her father would cast an angry look towards her, but without saying a word. So that was what it felt like, to get the cold shoulder from a parent. _Another happy first._

Then she remembered she was going to get married the following day, and felt like crying. What else could go wrong?

She raised her eyes from the ground only to realize a familiar dark-haired woman was standing right in front of her, with her impeccable casual style, the nicest boots Emma had ever seen and some enticing fragrance that reminded her of a luxurious universe of which she would never be a part of herself.

_Tamara._

'_Great,'_ Emma thought. '_Just when you think you've hit rock bottom.'_

"Emma, are you okay?" the other woman asked, and apart from her beautiful voice, Emma had time to realize Tamara's makeup was also flawless, whereas hers would only be a match to Joker after a bad day out in the rain. "You look terrible!"

'_Why me?'_ Emma asked herself in silence. '_Why?'_

"Well…" she replied, trying to fix her hair that was starting to look an awful lot like cotton candy. Damn that humid weather! "Didn't have a very good night."

"I would say a 'not very good night' is an understatement," Tamara replied, with a merciful smile. "What do you say we go get some coffee?"

"Oh, no, really, I'm fine, I'm…" Emma muttered. "I'm going home."

'_With my father, who has just bailed me out of jail,'_ she completed mentally. '_But you can go have coffee with your… fiancé.'_

Emma had to make a tremendous effort to stop swaying after her mind insisted on displaying images of the two lovebirds who were about to tie the knot making out over a table at Granny's.

"Hey, look, Tamara," she said, tucking her hands in her pockets and trying to show that she still had plenty of dignity in her. She shouldn't blame that woman for being engaged to the man that she, Emma, loved. If anything, she had won Neal's heart fair and square, and stumbling across them days before their wedding was just a case of very bad timing, and the most gruesome irony of fate. And anyway, she didn't love Neal anymore, she was just… _confused._ "Look, I just wanna say that I truly wish you…"

'_Die…'_

"I truly wish you have…" she tried again, ignoring the evil voice at the back of her mind.

'_A most painful death.'_

"I mean, I hope…" she blinked, shaking her head.

'_All your teeth fall out.'_

"I really hope," she said, louder this time, pressing her fingertips to her temples with her eyes closed, "that my run-in with Neal hasn't given you the wrong impression."

"Oh no, Emma, don't worry," Tamara replied, and Emma was beginning to hate that kindness in her voice. "I would never blame Neal for a mistake he made 11 years ago."

Speechless, she opened her eyes to find Neal's fiancée raising an eyebrow and looking at her with a disdainful sneer.

"Have a great day, Emma."

As Tamara walked past her, Emma Swan felt the ground beneath her feet had disappeared for a millisecond.

"Emma?" David asked, glancing at his daughter as she grew awfully pale.

"I need to throw up," she announced, running towards the house.

"Wait," he made to follow his daughter, but it was too late. "Not in the mailbox!"

* * *

"Neal?"

Neal woke up with a soft touch on his face.

"Love?" he could hear Tamara's soft voice, but bringing himself to open his eyes and face her after his deplorable behavior in the last few days required some extra courage he didn't actually feel he had that early in the morning. "Why did you sleep on the couch?"

He swallowed when he realized her voice had a trace of unmistakable hurt.

"Tamara, baby, I am so sorry…" he muttered, bringing himself to a sitting position and rubbing his eyes. "I really am."

"Here, I brought you some coffee… and pumpkin pie," she whispered, taking a seat next to him.

He finally gathered enough nerve to look at her face, and his stomach sank when his eyes met hers. He had been acting like a genuine imbecile since Emma had crossed his path, and it was time he set the record straight.

"Tam…"

"Maybe we should just call it off," she said, shrugging.

"What?" he exclaimed, feeling like she had slapped him awake. Well, act like am imbecile… and that was what you got. "Why?"

"Neal, please…" she whispered, smiling as she placed a hand over his leg. "You haven't been yourself since you met your ex-girlfriend. Don't you think I know what that means?"

"Tamara, no," he said, feeling his head pound as her words touched a sore spot he was having a hell of a hard time ignoring. "Please don't, it's not what you're thinking."

"Really?" she asked. "And what am I thinking?"

Neal let out a sigh as he pressed the heels of his hands against his eyes, honestly hoping that conversation would come to an end soon.

"Regina called me this morning to tell me you decided to bring forward the wedding."

Oh. _That._

He rolled his eyes. If he wasn't screwed enough before, he surely was now.

"How can you make such a decision without talking to me first?" Tamara asked.

"Honey, listen" he said, and when he grabbed her hands, there was nothing but despair in his eyes. "I know I have been acting like an idiot, and I'm not even going to lie to you because I don't think I would do a very good job," he continued, hoping that honesty would buy him a second chance. "I have been thinking about Emma Swan. A lot."

He watched as her eyes seemed to darken, and she clenched her jaw.

"But…" he whispered, and then adrenalin rushed through him when he realized there was no 'but'. He had been thing a lot about Emma Swan, and that was it. There was nothing that could complete that sentence in a way that would please the woman in front of him, not if he told her the truth, including as to why he had brought the wedding forward, in the first place: because he felt he was on the verge of changing his mind.

"But what, Neal?" she asked, and he was quick to notice there was a strain of irritation in her voice.

"But I choose to be with you," he said, pressing her hands into his, and brushing off that stupid little hope that he and Emma still had anything in common. _They didn't._ They'd had their chance eleven years ago, then they had drifted apart, he met Tamara, and she was a great girl, and they had fallen in love, and that was it. "And I just need you to give me a chance to do this right."

She lowered her eyes to their hands, and when she looked at him again, he was glad to realize part of her anger seemed to have dissolved.

"Are you sure?" she whispered.

"I am," he replied, tucking a strand of black hair behind her ear before touching her face.

She let out a sigh and smiled, before speaking again.

"Ok. But I should say that after last night, this is your second strike," she laughed, moving closer to kiss him. "One more and you're out!"

"Baelfire?"

Neal felt like bursting into flames when his father's voice rang in his ears a second before Tamara's lips touched his.

'_Just ignore him,'_ his mind told him, as he smiled and moved to cover the infamous inch separating him from his future wife.

"BAE?"

Neal jumped to his feet when his father screamed, feeling very lucky he was not carrying a weapon with him at that moment.

"WHAT?" he yelled back.

"For crying out loud," said Rumplestiltskin with a little smile as he made his way onto the living room after having just returned from his field trip with August. '_Timing is everything these days,'_ he thought, walking towards his son with the phone on his hands. "Why all the screaming, my boy?" he whispered. "He hasn't quite been himself these days, don't you think?" he asked, looking very amused as he turned to face Tamara before handing Neal the telephone. "It's for you."

Neal ripped the phone away from his father's hands, and the look in his face would make any serial killer look harmless.

"Well, I should get going," Tamara said, as she rose to her feet and picked up her bag. "I have lots of things to take care of, before the wedding."

She gave her fiancé a quick peck on the lips and left.

"Hello?" Neal whispered over the phone, as Tamara closed the door behind her. His face twitched when he heard the busy signal, and his fingers clumsily pressed the phone buttons to end the inexistent call. "There is nobody," he hissed as he turned to look at his father, aware that the serial killer inside him was showing, again.

"I'm not surprised," the other man replied, with a shrug. "After you let him waiting for that long… I would hang up, too."

Rumplestiltskin made to take the phone from his son's hands, but the other man was still grabbing it for dear life.

"Why?" Neal asked, his voice a dangerous whisper.

"Why what, Bae?"

"Why can't you just let me be _happy?_" the other man replied, hating the tears that were threatening to spill from his eyes. He then let go of the phone, and marched off the living room.

Rumplestiltskin simply watched as the other man walked away.

"Oh, son…" he whispered. "If only you knew."


	5. 5 I'm glad you liked my gift

_**Disclaimer: Captain 'Twinkle Toes' Shakespeare belongs to the film adaptation of Stardust. Kudos to Robert de Niro, for giving us one of the funniest scenes in fiction.**_

* * *

_**A/N: The crazy Friday continues, and this time it is David's turn to get caught in the mess. He ends up paying Rumple and Neal a visit, and finds out, rather accidentally, what gift Emma's baby daddy really got from his father.**_

* * *

_**Chapter 5: I'm glad you liked my gift**_

David Nolan was not having a good day.

It had started with him coming face to face with Hook, a man he was growing to despise more than he thought imaginable. The worst part was, that time, he was not actually arresting the foulmouthed pirate, but letting him go, instead, after his own daughter had taken justice into her hands. And, according to Hook, not only justice, apparently. Oh, never before had he hated writing an occurrence report that much! That stupid pirate didn't spare him a single detail of his night out with Emma! When asked if he would want to press charges against her, the devil had had the nerve to laugh, and say that the only complaint he had was that Emma had promised to show him what a 'spreadeagle' was, but never did! Oh! He couldn't even remember his salacious words without his blood boiling!

He finished scrubbing off the mailbox, cursing under his breath. Damn Hook and damn Emma for her childish behavior, getting him out of bed in the middle of the night only to be scorned by a horny pirate and then, to bail her out of jail! His own daughter, the sheriff! What could be more absurd than that?

Oh, yes, he remembered. It had been equally absurd to stop by the gas station store not much later, only to find out that his credit card had been declined due to lack of available funds! And he had no money on him! Seriously, he had to have a talk with Snow, that was completely unacceptable. He clenched his jaw, pondering that if she had gone on another shopping spree, that was yet another reason to find a way back home, where their only concerns would be slaying dragons and rebuilding their castle. No more stupidities such as credit cards and shoe stores! Honestly! What kind of joke was his life becoming?

He threw the scrub into the bucket angrily, and as he wiped the sweat off his forehead with the back of his forearm, his eyes fell on a box that had been left on his porch. He picked it up from the floor and read the card that had been attached to it, feeling nothing else could humiliate him more.

He was obviously mistaken.

'_To the newest family guy: _

_If you think your sex life sucks now, wait until you've been married for a few years.'_

His eyes nearly jumped out of his head, and his mouth was hanging open when his wife arrived home.

"I'm back," Snow said, walking past him and carrying several bags of groceries into their house.

Unable to stop himself, he looked at the box again, unfolding whatever it was inside, and his ears turned red.

"Snow!" he screamed, storming past the door and into the kitchen. "Care to explain what this means?"

He held the card in front of her face with a disconcerted look in his eyes. As she read it, her brow furrowed, and she thought of laughing. However, one quick glance at David's furious face made her change her mind.

"I have no idea what this is," she said seriously, handing him the card.

"Well, I take it you know whose handwriting it is, at least?" he spitted out.

"Yes," she replied. "It's Rumplestiltskin's."

"You have been complaining about our sex life to Rumplestiltskin?"

"Oh, Charming, please," Snow replied, and a giggle escaped her lips. "Just listen to yourself."

"You laugh?" David whispered. "Look what that lunatic has sent me!" He picked up the blow-up doll as he spoke. "Do you know what this is?"

"Yes, I do!" he heard his wife reply, with much more amusement in her face than he would have liked to see.

"Then what is this?" he asked, quietly.

Snow covered her mouth and broke into a fit of laughter. She sometimes forgot that David had spent most of his time in Storybrooke in a coma, and hadn't had nearly as much access to the wonders of that new world as the other citizens had.

"Please, David, don't ask me to explain."

"You know what?" he said, taking the card back and shoving it in the box. "I've had enough!"

He then stormed out of the kitchen.

"Charming!" behind him, Snow screamed, in a mixture of laughter and concern. "Where are you going? Charming!"

Of course, it all boiled down to Rumplestiltskin, again. It was always that man. When it was not him, it was his son, sending his daughter into a downward spiral of unhappiness and sorrow, and as result, sending him along as well. _No._ That _had_ to stop. It was time to give his old rival a bit of his mind.

* * *

"Son?" Rumplestiltskin whispered, as soon as Baelfire showed up again in the living room, after sleeping for a few hours in Tamara's bedroom.

"What?" Neal replied, without really looking at his father's face as he fished for his bottle of gin and a glass behind the bar counter.

"I'm sorry if I upset you," he heard his father say. "I didn't mean to."

"You never mean to," he whispered back. "That is precisely the problem."

"I'm thinking of cooking something for us," Rumplestiltskin said, choosing not to delve longer on that topic. "Is chicken fine with you?"

Neal choked on his gin at his father's words. Whether he intended to be funny or not was a mystery to him, but the fact was that even when he was mentally unstable, he still managed to find the right words to say.

"Yeah…" he said, making a peculiar sound somewhere between a cough and a laugh. "Chicken sounds perfect."

He watched as his father shrugged, shaking his head.

"Oh, and by the way, I got you a little something this morning," Rumplestiltskin said, pointing at the box over the coffee table. "It's just a little joke, to lift your spirits."

The two of them exchanged a brief look, in which Neal had to remind himself he was still angry for his father trying to ruin his life at any given chance.

"You shouldn't have bothered," he whispered, pouring more gin into his glass, and keeping his glance down until his father had left the room.

When he was finally alone, he realized that the day was coming to a close and that it had been his last one as a single man, and he didn't know exactly what to think of it. He only wished he would be able to drink his way through the night and erase Emma off his mind for once and for all, really. The more he avoided seeing her during the day, the more his mind overreacted by putting her in his dreams at night, or whenever it was that he slept, and that was too much to handle.

He missed Henry. Every time he had tried to call the kid, the boy wouldn't pick up the phone. He wondered if his son was really avoiding him or if something else had happened.

He thought he should drop by the Charmings. But what if he did, and Emma answered the door? He was sure the woman was mad at him. But what if she wasn't? What if she invited him in, and they ended up making love on her parents' dining table, as he had dreamt they had just a few minutes ago?

He didn't know which scenario was worse.

As he gulped down more gin and dragged himself to the couch, he suddenly wished time would go by faster, then he would finally get married to Tamara and those shameful thoughts would take the hint and leave his mind, _forever._

His eyes fell over the present his father had bought him, lying over the coffee table. Now that some of the alcohol had kicked in, he was ready to see what the man's idea of a joke was.

'_To the lovebird who is about to get married:_

_For you to wear on your wedding night.'_

He read in the little card attached to the box, before opening it to find a pink silk dressing gown with pompoms carefully folded inside.

'_Captain 'Twinkle Toes' Shakespeare sends his regards,'_ Neal thought, wondering if his father had been considerate enough to add a pink fluffy fan to the package.

"Ah, who cares…" he moaned, clumsily taking off his T-shirt and wearing the gown. "And why wait until my wedding night to make a fool of myself…"

He looked at himself, and laughed. Now he _really_ wished he had a feathered pink fan - then he would be even more laughable than he already was, walking around the living room wearing sweatpants and pompoms.

Time to grab another bottle of gin.

"I've changed my mind," Rumplestiltskin said, as he came back into the living room, "What do you say we order some-"

His eyes finally located Baelfire spread across the sofa, with his feet over the coffee table, as he hugged a bottle of gin with one of his pink silk-clad arms.

"Nice gift," he heard his son whisper, with his eyes glued to the wall behind him. "It's just a little tight around the shoulders, but I guess I'll live."

"This is not the present I bought you," Rumplestiltskin whispered back, with a frown. "Or _is it?_"

"Unless you gave my present to someone else," Neal replied, trying to bring himself to a more decent sitting position, "I guess it is."

Rumplestiltskin shrugged.

"Well, I have to say you look good in pink."

"Of course I do," Neal said, as he looked around for his glass and, upon not finding it, drank some more gin straight from the bottle. "I look good in anything."

"Trying to drink your way into a blissful alcoholic coma?" Rumplestiltskin asked, after finding another empty bottle of gin by the sofa.

"Someone has been drinking my gin," Neal muttered, with a sad look on his face.

"Yes," his father replied. "You."

Rumplestiltskin then approached his son and took a seat by the coffee table, so that he was able to face the other man.

"Baelfire," he said, after taking away the bottle from his son's hand. "Gin is not the answer to your problem."

Neal blinked, trying to focus on what his father was going to say. Unfortunately, there was still sobriety enough in him for him not to.

"Don't marry Samara, son," Rumplestiltskin pleaded, staring deeply into his son's eyes. "Her name reminds me of something horrible! Of something like… hidden wells and people dying!"

Neal rolled his eyes. For a split second, he had actually believed that conversation would not be the usual nonsense, but he was obviously wrong.

"Her name is Tamara, papa."

"I know it is," the older man replied. "I was just trying to cheer you up." When he realized, however, that his son didn't seem to have found his joke all that humorous, he cleared his throat and got down to business. "You know she is not the one for you."

Neal let out a sigh, and let his head fall onto the couch.

"Drink all you like, lie all you like, scream until you're blue in the face, but you know, just as well as I do, that Tamara is not the one you want to spend the rest of your life with."

"You think it's easy," Neal muttered, looking at the ceiling with a sad smile. "That Tamara and I are a lie, that we have nothing together, but guess what?" he then shifted his gaze to his father's. "We _do_ have a story together. We… we had plans for the future. I… I actually thought I could be happy with her."

He paused, feeling the corners of his eyes prickle. He hated to feel that way, he wished things could be simple… Then no one would get hurt, no one would have to suffer.

"But now you realize you can't?" he heard his father whisper, and a tear ran down his face, and he didn't know what he hated the most: the fact alcohol was turning him into a sentimental fool, or the fact he was actually crying in front of his father.

"Emma Swan is past," his voice shook, but he had to get it out of his chest. "We were together eleven years ago, then all kinds of shit happened and each of us went separate ways. Why is this happening now?"

He lowered his head, feeling his father's hand on his shoulder as he let all his confused feelings wash through him.

"To show you that you are not prepared, Bae," Rumplestiltskin said, feeling truly sorry for the bundle of wrecked nerves his son had turned into. "And hurrying to the altar thinking that will help is a horrible mistake, especially if your fiancée has invested in this whole deal much more than you have."

Neal took a long, deep breath and wiped his tears away before raising his eyes to his father's.

"It's not fair with you, and it's not fair with her."

"I can't walk away on Tamara," Neal whispered, shaking his head.

"It's not about walking away," his father said, standing up and heading to the kitchen in order to make them some very strong, bitter, hangover-healing coffee. "It's about being honest."

He stopped midway, and turned to look at his son.

"It's about doing what is _right._"

Neal closed his eyes. He thought he hated when his father had one of his outbursts of madness, but he was wrong. He hated it _so much more_ when the old man was _lucid,_ and told him all those things he knew were true.

The doorbell rang, and before he could rise to his feet with the minimum amount of dignity a drunken man could fetch, his father had already reached the door.

"Yes?" Rumplestiltskin said, as he looked at the blond man standing at his doorstep with the utmost indifference.

"Rumplestiltskin!" David Nolan groaned, smashing the box under his angry fingers. "Can we have a word?"

"Only if you tell me who you are first."

"What?" David spitted out. "How can you not remember me?"

Rumplestiltskin narrowed his eyes, and looked at the other man with a sneer.

"Oh, yes!" he said, shortly before letting out an impish snicker. "I remember now!"

He stepped outside, and his eyes were ablaze as he stared at Prince Charming.

"I kicked your ass in the Enchanted Forest, not so long ago," he continued, with his trademark theatrical gestures. "With a sword! And then, without a sword! And then, with a sword ag-"

"Oh, shut up!" David snarled, shoving the box he was carrying into the other man's arms. "I'm here to demand an explanation!"

Rumplestiltskin looked at the box and the card, and quickly understood what that was all about.

"Oh, well, just a minor misunderstanding," he said, shrugging. "I actually bought this to my son."

"What?" David exclaimed, and his eyes were wide in shock. "What kind of father writes such a card to his own son?"

"One with a sense of humor, something that you clearly lack!" Rumplestiltskin barked back.

"What is going on here?"

Neal had finally reached the door, although the smell of gin filled David's nostrils at least fifteen seconds before the young man arrived at the scene in his gallant pink gown.

David simply stared at Henry's father, wondering how on earth _his own daughter_ had gotten involved with a man with such obvious mental issues.

"Oh, you are… Emma's father," Neal muttered before reaching out for a handshake. "How are you doing?"

He kept his arm outstretched for some moments, until he realized the reason why David was not shaking his hand was probably due to the fact his own hand was wrapped around a bottle of gin.

He quickly pulled it back.

"I am very well," David hissed, feeling a sudden urge to go back home before he did something really nasty to those two lunatics. "And so is Emma, in case you want to know, which I find highly unlikely, since _you never seemed to care that much about her,_" he spitted out. "She is getting married tomorrow!"

Neal swayed lightly, but touched the doorframe just in time to regain his balance.

"What?" Rumplestiltskin asked, with a frown. "To whom?"

"To Archie Hopper."

The older man let out a chuckle.

"_Archie Hopper?_" he repeated, with a disdainful sneer. "Well, my sympathy to all your family. To get engaged to a man with a name like that, she must have been really desperate!"

He then slammed the door on David's face, before he had the chance to return the insult.

Neal stood by his side, completely paralyzed.

"Honestly!" he heard his father exclaim. "What is wrong with the world? Has everyone gone mad?"

"You see," he whispered, and his eyes were void of feeling. "_This_ is why things have to be the way they are. Emma Swan is _past._"

"Son…"

"Emma Swan is past, and Tamara is the present. And the future," his voice was hoarse, and awfully serious as he spoke. "And I choose _her_."

He then shoved his bottle of gin in his father's hands, and turned on his heels.

"Now, if you will excuse me, I will go to bed with my future wife!" he announced, marching towards Tamara's room without realizing she hadn't come back home yet.

* * *

David cursed under his breath all the way back home.

_How dared_ the old fool slam the door on his face, after offending his daughter?

He opened the door to his residence with a punch, only to find Snow and Emma looking at him from the dining table.

"So?" his wife asked.

"I have nothing to say," he mumbled, biting his tongue before he reproached Emma for ever getting involved with someone that had Rumplestiltskin's bad blood running on his veins.

"David…" Emma muttered, looking at her own hands. "About what happened last night, I don't really know what to say."

"How about '_sorry for embarrassing you'_?" he hissed.

"I said I'm sorry," she replied.

"Actually," he whispered back, lowering his elbows onto the table to look into his daughter's eyes, " you didn't."

Emma let her head fall to the table, still holding a glass of water between her hands.

"Emma, what your father is trying to say is that you have to end this insanity," Snow said.

"Why is my marriage insanity?" the other woman asked, raising her eyes to her mother's.

"Because you will never be happy with a man you don't love!"

Now that comment had broken the proverbial camel's back.

"I'm not looking for love!" Emma screamed, feeling every single word crawl under her skin. "That ship has sailed. And then it sank. There were no survivors!"

"Emma…"

"You think I'm delirious. Well, I'm not. I know Archie is not the man for me. It's just that I have waited so long so find a home… And the man I love… he found it," she had to swallow to steady her voice again. "Only not with me."

"Oh, Emma," Snow whispered again, this time reaching out to hold her daughter's hand. "Marrying Archie is not going to fill that void."

"Oh, I know that. Nothing will. _No one_ will. Not Archie, not Hook…" she shrugged. "So what difference does it make?"

Her cell phone buzzed, and she took it out of her pocket to find that she had a dozen missed calls and texts from the night before, and the oldest of them read '_EBay Alert: Congratulations! Your "Brand New- Yellow Bug-Special Price" has just been sold'_.

She smiled sadly as she shook her head and pursed her lips.

"The thing about happy endings?" she asked, trying to bite back the tears as she looked at her mother's face. "Not everybody gets theirs."

She stood up, ignoring the violent throbbing in her temples, and headed back to her room.

"Oh, Charming," Snow said, as she watched Emma walk away. "She loves Rumplestiltskin's son _so much._"

The mere mention of that name made David's ears go red.

"She will forget him," he replied, unwilling to believe his daughter was meant to be happy with a man of that kind. "Archie is a good man."

"Charming, please, _wake up!_"

Snow had stood up, and now stared into his eyes.

"She _loves_ Rumplelstiltskin's son!" she repeated. "There is _no Archie_! We can't sit and watch our daughter throw her life out of the window."

"That man doesn't deserve Emma," Charming replied, shaking his head. "Snow, I've just been to his place, and he was drunk, wearing a pink gown!"

"Is that the best you can do?" she asked, crossing her arms. "You don't want him to get married to Emma because he was drunk, and wearing a pink gown?"

"He abandoned Emma when she was pregnant with our grandson!" he screamed.

"He never knew she was pregnant!"

"And now, he is engaged to another woman!" David held Snow's arms. "He is going to get married to another woman, and because of him, Emma is suffering, again!"

"She is suffering because he is making a mistake!"

"There is no way you can know for sure."

"But you can," Snow replied. "_You _can! You know love, Charming, you can surely recognize it when you see it on someone's face!" she said, grabbing his arms. "You've just been with him! What did you see?"

David closed his eyes, and shook his head again.

"_What did you see?_"

"I saw a desperate man," he answered, barely believing he was actually saying that. "He pretty much fell apart when I told him Emma was getting married."

"Oh, Charming!" Snow sighed in relief. "Then he loves Emma too!"

David let himself fall onto a chair. _What a day!_

"So what if he does, Snow?" he whimpered, knowing he would soon be dragged into some sort of crazy plan.

"We can't let him ruin his life, and Emma's."

"What do you suggest we do?" he asked, casting an exhausted look towards his wife. "You are hardly having any success convincing our daughter not to get married herself!"

"We'll need help," she said, crossing her arms as she raised an eyebrow.

"No," David replied, fully aware of what Snow was getting at.

"There's no other choice."

"No."

"Call him," his wife said, handing him his cell phone.

"No," he insisted. The crazy bastard had just slammed the door on his face!

"This is not about us, Charming," Snow said, and he finally admitted defeat as his shoulders drooped. "We need Rumplestiltskin to help us."


	6. 6 Is there a hooker in the house?

**_Disclaimer: If I owned Once Upon a Time, I would be richer, and my favorite characters would all be having drinks in Neverland. Plus, I would have MRJ in at least one scene wearing nothing but a sword._**

* * *

**_A/N: Ok. Something is rotten in the state of Denmark._**

**_*wipes away happy tears*_**

**_August tells Rumple and the Charmings what he knows about Tamara, but of course he is missing a part of the story. Trust me, you will want to hang around for the scene when she interacts with her family and shows them her dirty little secret. I should say that I'm talking about a family that I'm absolutely sure will never, ever become canon, even because the characters involved belong to another TV show. Perhaps you already know who I'm talking about, given her last name._**

**_Well… This story is a parody, right? That kind of justifies the absurdity of the whole thing._**

**_On with the show. Next chapter will be the beginning of a crazy, wild, messy wedding day for our two heroes._**

* * *

**_6. Is there a hooker in the house?_**

David felt his nostrils flare as he stared at his cell phone. He couldn't actually believe he was about to do that.

The things a father would do for his daughter's happiness.

'_Do you want to call this number?'_ read the message on the screen.

'_I most certainly do not,'_ he thought, as he pressed 'Yes'.

"Hello?"

"Hello."

"Hello."

"Rumplestiltskin?"

"Yes."

"This is David."

"What David?"

"Prince Charming."

"Ah."

David paused, before that fateful next sentence left his lips. Only Heavens knew what sort of delusional mess he would be sent into after he said those words.

"I need your help."

"What for?"

"To convince your son… not to get married"

Now, it was Rumplestiltskin who had fallen silent. David looked at the ceiling, immediately regretting that call.

Then the man on the other side of the line let out his familiar impish snicker, and a sigh.

"You'll be pleased to know that I had finally managed to do just that, a mere instant before you knocked at my door and broke into a girlish tantrum, you juvenile idiotic presumptuous fa-"

David pressed the 'End call' button before an irate Rumplestiltskin had time to finish his sentence.

"This is not going to work," he said, and Snow simply took the phone from his hands.

'_Redial?'_ the word popped on the screen.

"Do I have any other choice?" she whispered, ignoring her husband's puzzled look as she pressed 'Yes'.

"What now?"

"Rumplestiltskin?"

"Yes?"

"This is Snow."

"Who?"

"Snow White, Emma's mother. Prince Charming's wife."

A moment of silence.

"I ate a poisoned apple… once?" she muttered, and shrugged when David shook his head at her attempt to make Rumplestiltskin remember who she was.

"Oh yes! I remember now. _The fairest of them all._ How can I help you?"

"We can't let your son get married."

"My son?"

"Yes."

"What about your daughter?"

"We can't let her get married either."

"Yes, I agree. Have a good night!"

And then, he hung up.

"This is insane," Snow said, giving her husband the phone, with an exasperated look on her face.

"I told you…"

Snow's eyes fell on the cell phone Emma had left on their dining table. She quickly grabbed it, and scrolled down the contact list.

"August!" she exclaimed.

"August?" David asked, raising an eyebrow. "As in, August, also known as Pinocchio? The man who was supposed to look after our daughter, but never actually did?"

"Oh, please, Charming," Snow whispered. "He may as well be our last hope."

"My, oh my, what magnificent allies we got ourselves…"

She shook her head, and called the number without much of a second thought.

"Emma!" she heard the man exclaim. "What a surprise!"

"This is not Emma," she replied. "It's her mother."

"Oh."

There was a brief moment of silence, before the man spoke again.

"Snow… Well… _What a surprise!_"

"We need your help."

Another moment of silence.

"Can you meet us at Rumplestiltskin's?"

"Huh?"

"In ten?"

"You mean… meet you, Snow, at Tamara's place, or meet you _and Emma_ at Tamara's place? Just so I get prepared… _properly…_ for whatever it is… you have in mind."

"Me and Charming."

There was a sigh of relief on the other side of the line.

"Emma doesn't know we're going."

"Does Tamara know you're going?"

"Not really."

"Baelfire?"

"No."

"And neither does Rumplestiltskin. Correct?"

"Yes."

"Oh my… I don't know if this is a good idea."

"It probably isn't. Do you have a better one?"

"If I knew what is going on, maybe!"

"I can't really talk about it over the phone… It's complicated."

"What isn't, these days…"

August snorted, and sounded like he was taking a long, deep, breath before continuing.

"What about Henry?"

"He'll stay with Emma. We'll talk to him."

"Oh Lord… I have a bad feeling about this."

"Please, August."

The man let out another sigh.

"Fine, I'll be there in ten."

Snow hung up, and hurried to Henry's room.

"Charming, please grab my coat. I'll be with you in a minute."

"Henry?" she whispered, opening the door as silently as she could.

Her grandson rushed outside, looking over his shoulder.

"Is she sleeping in your bed, again?" she asked, in a whisper.

The boy nodded.

"I actually told her to…" he whispered. "I went to her room, and she was crying, so I thought she would feel better… if she wasn't alone."

"Oh, Henry!" Snow hugged the kid, who looked like he could do with a decent night of sleep himself.

"I miss my dad," he said. "Ever since Emma flushed my cell phone down the toilet, I haven't talked to him…"

"Oh, Henry!" Snow exclaimed again. "I am so sorry! You know your mother is going through a rough patch, don't you?"

The boy nodded, again, and rolled his eyes. If there was anyone who knew Emma hadn't been herself lately, it was him.

"Grandma?"

"Yes?"

"Emma still loves my dad, doesn't she?"

Snow let out a sad smile.

"Yes, I think she does, Henry."

"Why is she getting married to Archie?"

"Henry, I…" Snow started, but only shook her head in response.

"And my dad… I think he loves Emma, too."

Snow raised her eyebrows, knowing exactly where that train of thought would take her grandson.

"Why is he getting married to Tamara?" the boy asked her, with a huge question mark written all over his face.

"Henry, don't worry. You're not the only one who is confused," she whispered, patting him on the shoulder. "Right now, I think everyone is. Can I ask you a favor? Your grandpa and I need to go out, and we might be late. Can you keep an eye on your mother while we're away?"

"Ok…" he muttered, walking back into the room.

Snow watched as he carefully closed the door behind him, and turned on her heels.

It was time to go out and get her family back on track.

* * *

Rumplestiltskin was sipping the coffee he had prepared when the doorbell rang, again.

"I can't believe this," he snarled, as he rushed to the door. _Bloody neighbors!_

When he finally opened it, he found August standing before him.

"August?" he muttered, with a frown. "Did I call you?"

The other man smiled. _He should not lie_, and that was something he took very seriously. Luckily to him, due to people's imprecise questions, he could afford to be imprecise in his responses, and still be brave, selfless and true!

"Yes."

He didn't have to mention, however, that the man had called him that morning, and not that evening.

"No, I didn't."

"Yes, you did."

He kept looking at the older man's eyes, feeling absolutely in peace with himself.

"Well…" Rumplestiltskin replied, with a puzzled expression. "Come in, then."

August entered the house, with Charming and Snow closely behind him.

"What are these two doing here?"

"They're with me," August replied, to put a very suspicious Rumplestiltskin at ease.

"Wonders never cease, do they?" the older man muttered, heading to the dining room and pulling out a chair to return his attention to his now semi-cold coffee. "May I inquire as to what I owe the honor of your visit?"

"Shall we join you?" Snow asked, before taking a seat.

"I don't think I have much of a choice, do I?" Rumplestiltskin groaned. "Get a cup in the cupboard behind you."

She got three extra cups and helped herself to some coffee, and the other two men by her side did the same thing.

"Is Tamara in?" August asked.

"No," Rumplestiltskin replied, flatly. "She's busy with the preparations for tomorrow."

"What is going to happen tomorrow?" the other man asked.

"What do you think, you moron?" the other man replied, with a poisonous sneer. "The wedding."

"What wedding?" August asked, with a frown.

"_What wedding?_" Rumplestiltskin repeated, making a face. "You're very well-informed for a best man…"

August had knocked his own cup of coffee over his arm, but seemed to barely realize it.

"You can't be serious," he said, looking shocked. "Baelfire's wedding is not supposed to take place until the end of the month!"

Rumplestiltskin rolled his eyes.

"August…" Snow whispered, looking at the smoking hot coffee splashed over the man's arm with a look of concern on her face.

"How come he didn't tell me that?" August said, looking profoundly distraught.

"August…" Snow whispered again. "Your arm…"

He finally lowered his eyes to the smoke coming out of the hot liquid that had covered his forearm, and the reddish burn stain on his skin.

"Oh, I'm sorry," he said, as he stood up and headed to the kitchen. When he returned, he was holding a wet washcloth to his arm. "In all this transition between wood and flesh, then wood again, then flesh… I guess I lost some of the sensibility."

He took a seat again, still with a very confused look on his face.

"I honestly hadn't seen this one coming," he muttered.

"No one had," Rumplestiltskin replied. "I have to say, there are times when I can barely recognize my own son."

"You barely recognize anyone anymore…" David whispered, without lifting his eyes off his cup.

Rumplestiltskin gave him a glare that would have instantly soured milk.

"Gentlemen, this is not the time for bickering," August said, and then the two men glared daggers at him. "With all due respect, there is something awfully wrong going on here, and we have less than 24 hours to find a way out of this mess."

"Twelve," Rumplestiltskin replied, looking at the clock on the wall. "Baelfire rescheduled the ceremony for tomorrow morning, at ten."

"Well I'll be dammed…" August responded, scratching his head. "This is a complete disaster."

"Tell us something we don't know already," David groaned, feeling incredibly impatient with all the small talk.

"You wanna hear something that you don't know?" August said, looking over his shoulder and lowering his voice. "I will tell you something you don't know. Tamara's mother… well… I've seen the woman once, and I still have nightmares."

Now _that_ was a catchy conversation starter. Everybody had their eyes wide at the former puppet's revelation.

"She hates Baelfire," then, he shrugged. "Well, she seems to hate everyone, honestly, especially the men that come close to her daughters. I'll tell you now, and your son would agree with me: _that woman is the devil._"

"What a match made in heaven, then!" David laughed. "One has a father who is a devil, the other has the devil for a mother," he glanced at Rumplestiltskin, with an amused look. "I'm sure the two of you will get along just fine."

"Charming!" Snow hissed.

"This is no laughing matter," August urged. "I honestly don't think Baelfire was thinking straight when he brought the wedding forward. We had agreed we would look for the Blue Fairy so that she could bless us with some sort of spell before that woman rode into town."

"You're scaring me!" said snow, twisting her hands nervously.

"Well, you should be scared! There is something… _dark _about that woman."

There could be something dark about Tamara's mother, but when Rumplestiltskin stood up and went around the table to stand face to face with August, there was something even darker about _him._

"You're telling me…that you suspect…Tamara's mother…has something to do… with Dark Magic…" his pauses to match his speech to his steps were making everyone's hair stand on end. "And yet…you never tried to stop… _my son_… from getting engaged… to Tamara herself."

He was now standing a mere inch from August, who was still sitting and trying to avoid the man's deranged look hovering over his head.

"Look… Tamara is a nice woman," he whispered, trying to remain true to the first part of the trinomial he went by. "The problem is her mother."

"Oh, really?" Rumplestiltskin hissed, and August had to swallow a very bad, _bad_ feeling as to how that brief dialogue would end. "Because you know what I think, _Pinocchio?_"

August closed his eyes, knowing he shouldn't have pushed his luck. He had gotten away with the man almost remembering him that morning, why, _oh, why_ had he thought he would be that lucky twice?

"I think Tamara has magic in her hands as well," the older man spitted out, closing a hand around August's neck. "And my son… might be _in danger._"

Snow and Charming rose to their feet, and for a moment neither of them knew what to do.

"And you know what happens when my son is in danger?" the Dark One whispered again, feeling all his glorious evil power rushing through his veins. "I get very, _very_ angry."

"Rumplestiltskin, stop!"

Snow screamed, running back from the kitchen with a jar of water in her hands, and throwing it on Rumplestiltskin's face.

And then, it was gone.

"Well crack out the crayolas and color me pink…" David muttered, when he realized that Snow's desperate gesture had actually worked. The Dark One was _definitely_ not the same anymore, if all it took to put out his fire was a splash of tap water.

"So you were saying…" Rumplestiltskin said, as he wiped away a strand of wet hair from his eyes.

"Great," David said, still unable to believe they were actually counting on a completely delusional man to help them. "This is just great."

"Look, you all listen to me," August said, still shaken by his near estrangement. "Don't blame me for what is going on! Baelfire is my best friend! He and Tamara always seemed very happy together! Was I surprised when he got engaged?_ Yes, I was!_ I thought he would wait for Emma, but maybe he just… _lost hope._ And then he meets this girl, and starts smiling again, why would I go against it? And if we are all here to sabotage his wedding, I'm sorry, but I can't do it. I'm out."

Rumplestiltskin stood up and walked to the kitchen.

"August," Snow said, looking into the other man's eyes. "I know that _you know_ that Baelfire loves Emma."

"That is the problem!" the man exclaimed. "But he still wants to get married to Tamara, who am I to go against it?"

"I don't know what to do…" Snow whispered, before letting her head fall to the table.

"Well, luckily for you, I do," Rumplestiltskin said. "I have to talk to Regina Mills first thing in the morning."

"Funny," August whispered, remembering something that Baelfire had noticed not long ago. "Hers is the only name you don't seem to forget. Apart from Baelfire's, of course"

"Yes… I remember her name all too well," Rumplestiltskin muttered in return.

He wished he remembered more than that, though.

"So you will help us?" said Snow, as relief washed over her.

"Do I look like a philanthropist?" Rumplestiltskin snarled.

"But this is about your son!" the woman replied, and there was a strain of despair in her voice.

"What about my son?"

Snow and Charming seemed on the verge of having a stroke.

"I got this," whispered August, as he approached a puzzled-looking Rumplestiltskin.

"They don't want Baelfire to get married, you don't want Baelfire to get married," he made sure to stress every word, as if speaking to a rather slow 5-year-old. "It's a shared goal, do you understand?"

"Ah!" the older man whispered back.

"Ok?"

"But I _do_ want Baelfire to get married!"

David blinked, and wondered if he had heard it right. He was about to make another acid remark when August raised a hand, and motioned for him to be quiet.

"You want your son to get married _to whom?_" he asked, very slowly and carefully, in order not to awaken the Beast inside the other man again anytime soon.

"Oh, don't ask me that question!" Rumplestiltskin replied, suddenly looked very depressed. "The paper I showed you this morning is in my other pants!"

"Ok, not a problem, not a problem," August said, trying to remain collected and calm. "Let's resort to a quick trivia, then, ok? You want your son to get married to…" as he spoke, his eyes never left the other man's face, "option A: Sharon Stone…"

"Who the hell is Sharon Stone?" Rumplestiltskin asked, with a frown.

"Never mind that," August replied, actually relieved the man was so quick to dismiss that first name. "Option B, Tamara Slater. Option C…" he paused, and made sure to stress his next two words. "Emma Swan…"

Rumplestiltskin, however, just kept looking at him.

"Option D…" August's voice was now dying away. "None of the above?"

Baelfire's father blinked, and seemed to be lost in thought for a long minute.

"What were the other options again?" he finally asked.

"Oh, this is ridiculous," David exclaimed, jumping from the chair. "Let's go, Snow, we're just wasting our time."

The sound of someone fumbling for their keys outside the main door made all of them freeze on the spot.

"It's Tamara," August hissed. "She's back!"

"Perfect!" David whispered.

"Hurry, into the kitchen!" Rumplestiltskin hissed as well, handing Charming his cup and Snow's, and pushing the two of them into the kitchen.

He had barely closed the door behind him when Tamara entered the living room.

"August?" she asked, as her eyes slowly moved from the man by the dining table to Neal's father near the kitchen door. "I… I didn't expect you to be here."

"And I didn't expect_ to be_ here…" he replied, holding his cup of coffee with much more strength than necessary. Boy, was he in trouble. If Tamara started interrogating him, they would all be lost. He could not lie!

"Is everything okay?" she asked again, raising an eyebrow.

August raised his eyes to the woman with a faint smile on his lips. Such a simple question… but the 'yes' got stuck on his throat!

"Yes, yes," Rumplestiltskin finally came to his rescue, pulling out a chair and sitting next to him. "We were just… having coffee."

"Where's Neal?"

David and Snow remained glued to the kitchen door, trying to make out what the people in the other room were saying. When Tamara asked about Neal, they both exchanged a surprised look, realizing they had completely forgotten about the man during their little confabulation. Standing before Tamara, August quickly came to the same conclusion, and let out another heartless smile.

"He went to bed early," Rumplestiltskin replied, shrugging.

"Well…" Tamara said, as she placed a few bags and packages over the bar counter. "Then I guess I'll have a shower and join him… Tomorrow will be a very busy day."

She turned to look at the two men again, and both of them felt slightly uncomfortable under her gaze.

"Good night to you both," she whispered, walking past them as she headed to her bedroom.

"Wait," Rumplestiltskin hissed, grabbing August's arm when he made to walk to the kitchen. "She will come back."

And indeed, after less than two minutes, Tamara was back in the living room, looking particularly displeased.

"Why is Neal wearing a dressing gown?" she asked, and her eyes were piercing Rumplestiltskin's as she spoke.

Behind the kitchen door, David rolled his eyes.

A few steps away from the kitchen door, August frowned, and his eyes darted from Tamara to his friend's father.

"I go out, and you bring some hooker in?" realizing the old man was not planning on answering her former question, Tamara decided to be more specific.

"No…" Rumplestiltskin snorted, waving a dismissive hand. "Trust me, there was no hooker…"

"Really?" she asked, crossing her arms, and there was an impending threat in her narrowed eyes. "So my fiancé is in my bed, completely drunk, wearing nothing but a pink gown, and I should conclude that _nothing happened_ while I was out?"

"You didn't tell me he was wearing_ nothing_ but a pink gown when you met him," Snow whispered, looking at a frowning David.

"That's because he was wearing pants when I saw him…" he whispered back. "I think!"

"Dearie," outside the kitchen, it was Rumplestiltskin who spoke. "If you really are that suspicious, why don't you use that remarkable sniffing sense of yours? I'm telling you, the-"

"I actually smell female perfume," she whispered, as she raised her head and her nostrils flared.

Behind the kitchen door, Snow raised her eyebrows as she sniffed her own wrists.

"_Cheap_ female perfume," Tamara hissed, narrowing her eyes in anger.

Snow's eyes went wide. "Cheap?" she mouthed, indignantly.

Neal's fiancée let a smile curl her lips, before moving ever so slowly to look at August one more time.

August, once again, felt he was in trouble. Oh, how he missed Phuket!

"August," she asked, as her eyes bore into his. "Was there a woman in this house?"

"When?" he asked meekly, hoping to buy some time.

"While I was out during the evening?"

Oh no! She had asked a specific question! That was it, there was no escape now.

"Y-Yes," he stuttered, and the woman's eyes seemed to catch fire. "It's his last night as a single man!" he whispered, and that was the most absolute truth!

"Did they have sex on my bed?" she hissed, and August could swear she was trying to blind him with that fiery glare.

"Oh, no, no," August replied, suddenly very disgusted at the thought of Snow White and Baelfire engaging in such act. "No, for crying out loud, of course they didn't!"

Her eyes then shifted to Rumplestiltskin, who also looked a tad disturbed.

"Oh, no…" he said, shaking his head. He had to bite his tongue not to add that if it had been the woman's daughter in their house paying his son a late visit, he would have actually been the first to lock the two of them in _dearest Tamara's_ bedroom so that they could set not only her bed, but the entire place, into the most lustful fire. "Definitely, there was no sex. I would have noticed. I was with him the whole time," he completed, letting out an impish snicker.

"Well," Rumplestiltskin's words seemed to have convinced her. "I need to drag him into the shower. Will one of you help me out?"

"I will," August said, raising his eyebrows as he looked at Rumplestiltskin, who got the hint and hurried to the kitchen as soon as Tamara and August disappeared down the hall.

"Look, you two go home, and do whatever you can to stop Emma Swan from getting married," he hissed, leading Snow and Charming out of the house.

"You remembered her name!" said Snow, with hope dripping from every single word.

"Well, yes," Rumplestiltskin replied, with a sneer. "My brain is pretty much a Swiss cheese, but eventually it works. But sometimes it doesn't, so don't get your hopes up."

He grabbed David's arm just before the other man stepped outside.

"I want my son to be happy," he said, and there was something in his eyes that looked an awful lot like a scream for help. "I will not let him down, not again."

David nodded, and for a moment their differences did not matter. He knew what it was like to be a parent.

"We'll do what we can to keep Emma single," he replied. "Just do your part."

Rumplestiltskin closed the door in a hurry when he heard footsteps in the living room.

"Nice gown," August whispered, making sure Tamara had not followed him. "Let me guess… Emma got the blow-up doll?"

"No," Rumplestiltskin answered, and then chuckled. "Her father did."

August had to stifle his laughter, still fearing Tamara would come back at any moment.

"No wonder the man looked like he could kill you," he whispered.

"You should go home, now…" Rumplestiltskin said, realizing Tamara was with his drunken son in the shower, and worrying sick about the possibilities such an occasion offered. "Tomorrow will be a very busy day."

He then ran to the bathroom, ready to give Tamara some hell.

August watched the man leave, and slowly walked out of the house.

"Tomorrow will be a very busy day…" he repeated. "I just hope all of us survive it!"


	7. 7: Queens, mirrors and a wedding

_**Disclaimer: Nope. I still own nothing. Marc and Wilhelmina Slater belong to "Ugly Betty". Yes, Anthea T., you got that right, Tamara's mother is the woman herself!**_

* * *

_**A/N: Dark Rumple makes a triumphant return as he pays a visit to Regina Mills, but his failure to remember another evil queen may land Neal in an awful lot of trouble. In the meantime, Emma gets ready to go down the aisle and thinks that maybe going back to her days as a thief might bring her some joy as she decides to steal something from her ex-boyfriend.**_

* * *

_**Chapter 7: Queens, mirrors and a wedding cake **_

Regina Mills let out a sigh as she headed for another day of work.

It would still take time for her to get used to her new job. It had been so much more fun to be the mayor in that quaint little city, but after the infamous Emma Swan broke the curse, there would be very little point bossing the town idiots around.

To make matters worse, after Storybrooke had pretty much become the newest amusement park in Maine, with outsiders coming in and out all the time and forcing everyone to keep a low profile, there were not many options left for those trying to change careers.

She shrugged, and an evil smile curled her lips. As a matter of fact, getting into the wedding-planning business had been quite a smart idea. She was still able to destroy people's lives, after all.

And their finances, obviously. Not to mention it was the perfect front for her _other business_, the one she truly loved with all her heart.

Her smile turned into a grin, and then into a giggle, and then into laughter.

She opened the door to her office, and when she saw Rumplestiltskin sitting on her President chair, with his legs up her desk, her laughter turned into a giggle, then into a smile, and then into a grimace.

"What are you doing here?" she asked, sending him a very obvious "I-hate-you" glare.

"My dearest Regina," he said, returning the glare with the same courtesy. "I think you know the answer to that question."

He twisted a business card in his fingers, and her eyes grew wide.

"How did you find that?" she hissed.

"Let's say I made sure to get here earlier than you, to inspect this little office of yours," he replied, wiggling his hands around. "And you know what they say…" he said, before jumping from her chair to move towards the woman. "The early bird _catches_ the worm," he whispered in her ear, before letting out his trademark snicker.

"Think again, you old fool," she said, with a sneer on her lips.

She then snapped her fingers, and the card in Rumplestiltskin's hand dissolved into a purple cloud of magic.

Rumplestiltskin hopped up and down, clapping his hands excitedly.

"Oooh!" he exclaimed, with a maniac look on his face. "I love your phony little tricks!"

He snapped his fingers, and the card was back in his hand.

"Do it again!" he teased, waving the card in front of the woman's eyes.

This time, however, Regina Mills set the little piece of paper in flames while it was still pressed between Rumplestiltskin's fingers.

"Oh, my, feeling antsy today, are we?" he said, and his eyes were still ablaze as he looked at Regina.

"You are pathetic," she replied, wishing the venom in her words would cut through his skin and finish the job Hook had started.

"Am I, really?" he asked, baring his teeth as he got closer to the woman. "Perhaps I am. But even so," his eyes were now two orbs of fire as he hissed, "even if I only have half of a functioning evil mind, _you are no_ _match for me._"

He raised a mirror to her eyes, and much to her dismay, she saw that the words in the business card were now tattooed to her forehead.

"Regina Mills, _divorce attorney_," he read the words aloud, getting rid of the mirror and wondering how long it would take for a struggling Regina Mills to run out of air if he strangled her right now. "What's the name of your company, again? '_Happy endings'_?"

The woman before him was far too busy trying to get rid of the letters glowing on her forehead to even bother answering.

"Your wedding-planning biz _is_ a front, after all! You trap those deluded young couples into going on with their wrong choices, oh yes, because you can detect when they are not meant for each other, can't you?" he hissed, walking around the woman in circles. "Then you dazzle them with your magnificent cakes and table sets, rip them off, knowing they will be too worried about their debt to even consider they may be marrying the wrong person, and then, when money is no longer the matter, and they finally see what a bad, bad decision they have taken… Oh!" he stopped, pretending to clutch his own heart as his eyes grew wide. "Guess who shows up to help! Beloved Regina Mills, divorce attorney extraordinaire, aiming for their pockets and souls once again!"

He smiled his most wicked smile, and leaned against her desk before pointing his index finger at her as if it was a smoking gun.

"Busted!" he whispered, hopping up and down again.

"What do you want?" Regina muttered, and the look in her eyes was positively murderous.

"Are you trying to strike a deal, deary?"

"What do you _want?_"

"Who is celebrating the wedding?"

"Never," she replied, taking one step closer to him and hoping she would be able to scorch that stupid evil man with the burning hate in her eyes. "I won't let you ruin one of my weddings."

"Really?" he asked, looking at his own nails. "Would you rather have me ruin your career, instead?"

Regina looked as if smoke would billow out of her nostrils at any given moment.

"Her name is Lacey," she hissed, reaching out for a piece of paper and almost tearing it apart as she wrote down the woman's phone number. "Here."

"What are you giving me that for?" Rumplestiltskin asked, looking at the piece of paper the woman was holding. "You make the call, and you cancel it, _right now_."

After giving the man in front of her another poisonous glare, Regina Mills picked up the phone and dialed the number.

"Don't bother coming this morning," she hissed to whoever had picked up the phone. "The wedding is cancelled."

"Good girl!" he exclaimed, as he waved a hand and the letters on Regina's forehead disappeared.

He moved to the door, but stopped after a few steps to talk to the woman again.

"One more thing, deary," he slowly turned his head to look at Regina Mills. "If I ever learn you offered to plan a wedding to anyone in my family ever again, there will be consequences."

He bowed, although his eyes never left hers, and said his goodbyes.

"Now if you will excuse me, I have a wedding to stop."

Much to his surprise, Regina giggled behind him.

"You're so worried about me..." she said, barely making an effort to hide the excitement in her voice. "When actually, your son is getting married to Tamara Slater."

He frowned, but didn't turn to look at her.

"And your point is?" he asked, blinking away his concern that his own mind was letting him down again.

"Slater?" she repeated, and her voice was thoroughly amused as she spoke. "As in, _Wilhelmina Slater_'s daughter?"

Given the emphasis Regina added to that name, Rumplestiltskin was pretty sure whoever that woman was, she was not someone he could afford to forget at the moment.

"Oh my God," she exclaimed, finally reaching him and walking around him to look at his face. "You don't remember who Wilhelmina Slater is, do you?"

The smile on Regina's face verged on the obscene.

"You know those 'Wizard Worldwide' conferences we used to attend?" she continued, basking on his defeated silence. "You should have paid attention to some of the talks."

Now, the woman might be just cracking a joke_. 'Wizard Worldwide'?_ That certainly didn't sound like the type of event any of them would attend. But then, she might be serious as well. One way or another, the undeniable truth was that Regina had gotten the upper hand in those last few minutes, and now Rumplestiltskin found himself in a very delicate position.

"You really lost your edge, didn't you?" she whispered in his ear, and he had to leave the room before his situation got even worse.

Normally, he would never walk out on a duel against Regina Mills.

The problem was, now he realized she was a mere pawn in the greater scheme of things, and he had no time to waste. He had to find a way to remember who Wilhelmina Slater was, and how to stop her, for that matter.

And he had to do so before it was too late.

* * *

"_Happiness hit her like a train on a track… Coming towards her, stuck still no turning back"_

Emma Swan took a long, deep breath as she looked at the mirror. Sitting by her side, Snow carefully arranged her daughter's hair in a very intricate braid, casting a worried look towards Emma every now and then.

"_She hid around corners and she hid under beds, she killed it with kisses and from it she fled… With every bubble she sank with a drink, and washed it away down the kitchen sink"_

"You're making a mistake," Snow finally said, only to have Emma pull her head away from her hands. She was breaking their deal, after all: her daughter had only agreed to let her help get prepared for her wedding under the condition neither of them talked.

There was nothing left to be said.

"The dog days are over, the dog days are done…" Emma muttered, following the song that was quietly playing from her IPod.

She kept staring at the mirror, as if expecting someone else, other than her, to appear before her eyes.

"_The horses are coming… so you'd better run."_

A few houses away from her, Neal Cassidy also stared into a mirror, and also hoped to see someone else other than himself.

He adjusted the tie around his neck, and took out the wedding rings he was carrying on his pocket, just to look at the names engraved on them.

'Neal Cassidy'

'_Tamara Slater'_

He put the rings back into his pocket, as his other hand gently touched the mirror.

"_Run fast for your mother, run fast for your father, run for your children, for your sisters and brothers…"_

Emma reached out to touch the mirror in front of her, remembering a movie she had once seen. She half expected the solid surface to melt under her fingers, and take her into another dimension, but who was she fooling?

A mirror was just a mirror. There was nothing, _and no one_, on the other side.

"_Leave all your love and your longing behind, you can't carry it with you if you want to survive."_

Neal raised his eyes to the mirror, as his hand slowly closed into a fist.

He studied his reflection for a second, wondering exactly when he had grown that old. How come time had gone by that fast? Eleven years… and now the rest of his life, without her.

He was officially leaving Emma Swan _forever_.

"I'm getting married today," he whispered.

"_And I never wanted anything from you, except for everything you had… and what was left after that too."_

She was officially leaving Neal Cassidy_ forever_.

"I'm getting married today," she whispered, and Snow felt a pang in her heart as she saw how unhappy Emma was as she said those words. "And not to you."

Emma closed her eyes for a moment, and smiled.

"Who would have thought..."

She then silenced the IPod and stood up.

"So," she asked, spreading her arms so that her mother could see her in her white suit glory and stylish stilettos. "How do I look?"

Snow White, by that time, was already melting away in tears and sobs.

"W-Wonderful," she managed to stutter.

Emma reached out to rub her shoulder, and quickly left the room before she was dragged into another of her many downward spirals of unhappiness.

"Hey kid!" she exclaimed, as soon as she saw Henry leave his own room and walk towards her. "Look at you! You're wearing a suit!"

"Emma…" David whispered, and his jaw dropped when he saw his daughter. "Look at you!"

"Oh please, don't go crying on me as well," she said, rolling her eyes when she realized her father's eyes were glistening with tears. "I'm not even wearing a dress."

"It doesn't matter," he answered, clearing his throat. "You are still my daughter."

"Wow," she said, trying to ignore the prickle at the corner of her eyes at her father's words. "Thanks for reminding me."

He hugged her, and his eyes met Snow's, who was standing by the door of her daughter's room.

"You know," he heard Emma say. "If I don't leave this house right now, my make-up is going to be a mess."

"Where are you going?" Henry asked.

"Hmm…" Emma replied, pulling away from the hug, and sniffing. "I just realized I don't have a wedding cake, so…" she wiped away a tear and shrugged. "I'll just get myself one."

* * *

August hurried into the building, still busy wearing his jacket.

He couldn't actually believe Baelfire was getting married in a couple of hours.

"You are unbelievable," he complained, as he tried to catch up with the other man. "Just so you know, I had booked the ultimate bachelor party, I was even flying strippers from Vegas! Not to mention that you would have a very relaxing day at the spa before the wedding ceremony, but too bad I couldn't reschedule it, given the fact you forgot to tell me you were getting married _today_!" he barked. "What were you _thinking?_"

"I don't know, August," Neal replied, feeling exceptionally calm despite the dire circumstances. "I don't really know."

"Did you know Franz Ferdinand was supposed to play in your reception? Yeah, I had arranged that too."

"You hired Franz Ferdinand?" Neal said, wrinkling his forehead. "No wonder I'm going bankrupt..."

"Just so you know, they wouldn't charge," August replied. "They owed me a favor, after I subbed for their drummer in a concert in Phuket after the man got sick eating some bad shrimps."

"Oh," Neal muttered, as he looked around the hall where he would get married in a couple of hours. He found it extremely odd that the place hadn't got a bit of decoration in itself. "Regina Mills is nowhere to be found," he whispered, and his eyes fell on one of the benches were soon enough their guests would be sitting.

"Oh, really?" August asked, trying to fake a reasonable amount of surprise. Unless something else had happened to the wedding-planner, her absence could only mean that Rumplestiltskin had succeeded in doing whatever it was he had planned to do.

"Yes," Neal responded, with his hands in his pockets. "Something must have happened."

His voice however, showed no signs of concern.

"Baelfire, are you okay?" August asked, raising a suspicious eyebrow at his friend's tranquility. "Are you on prescribed meds or something?"

"Nope," Neal shrugged. "I am just… _fine._"

August took another look at the man by his side, and quickly realized that was exactly the same kind of resignation to be expected of someone who had just been given a life sentence.

"Are you sure about this?" he asked.

"About what?" was his friend's meek response.

"About getting married."

"Oh please, not you. You know Tamara, you know how much we get along."

"Yes, you get along alright…"

"She's a wonderful woman, and I really, really like her."

August shook his head, uncertain as to whether or not he should point out what was wrong in his friend's sentence.

"Baelfire, do you like me?" he asked, at last.

"Of course I do."

"Then why don't you marry me instead?"

Neal stopped walking, and cast an outraged look towards August before speaking.

"_What?_"

"You _like_ me right?" August shrugged.

"You're a _man_!" Neal exclaimed.

Ok, so maybe using himself as an example had not been the brightest idea. No wonder he hadn't managed to get his message across.

"That is not my point!" August blurted out, before he blushed even more. "You don't marry a person you _like_. You go to the movies with someone you like, you go out for drinks, you talk over the phone, you don't get yourself _married_ to someone you _like_! You marry the person you _love_!"

He watched as the other man seemed to chew on his tongue, with a very menacing look in his eyes.

"And I'm sorry to tell you this, my friend, but you don't love Tamara."

Neal blinked several times and swallowed, one of his trademark reactions when something was not well.

"You know what," he said, trying to regain his composure. "I'm going out for a walk."

"You're just being stubborn," August said, as the other man walked away. "And if your pride means that much to you… Then _you don't deserve her_," he finished, realizing that Neal had slowed down his pace for a brief moment at his final words, only to pick up his step a second later and hurry out of the hall.

August rolled his eyes. He had promised not to sabotage his friend's wedding, and now look at the kind of advice he was giving!

He took his cell phone out of his pocket, and called Charming.

"So?" he asked, when Emma's father answered the call.

"She's left to get herself a wedding cake."

"You mean she's out?" he asked.

On the other side of the line, David snorted.

"Obviously!"

"Well, Baelfire has just gone out as well."

"Do you think they might run into each other?"

"That would be rather interesting, don't you think?"

"It would… Oh, hold on, I have another incoming call, it's Rumplestiltskin."

August waited for an update as Emma's father got another report.

"Ok," said David, as he got back on line. "Rumplestiltskin tells me Regina Mills is out of the picture."

"I thought she was."

"But he is worried about a certain Wilhelmina Slater."

August's blood froze when that name registered in his brain.

"He asks you to keep an eye on Baelfire until he figures out what to do about her."

"Alright," August whispered, and as he turned around, he saw a black limo pull out in front of the building where the wedding would take place. "Oh, crap."

"What was that?"

"You'd better let Rumplestiltskin know he needs to figure something out as soon as possible," he muttered, as the door to the limo opened and a pair of very long and slender legs made their way out of the vehicle, covered by a long turquoise satin dress. "Wilhelmina Slater has just arrived."

He ended the call, and his mouth went dry when the woman slowly made her way towards him, her posh hat hiding her nearly transparent eyes until the very last moment.

"August W. Booth," she whispered, sending him a feral grin as she outstretched her arm for a handshake.

"Wilhelmina Slater," August muttered, slightly taken aback by the fact the woman remembered his full name. As he felt her fingers wrap around his rather forcefully, shivers went up and down his spine, and the fact she had just raised her head to reveal her diabolical blue eyes from under the hat made him feel a very uncomfortable tingle in his fingertips.

"Long time no see," she whispered, as her eyes bore into his.

"Indeed," he mumbled, feeling a sudden urge to leave before the woman in front of him claimed his soul.

"Though I have to say I truly enjoyed your little performance with Kapranos' boys in Phuket, " she said, finally letting go of his hand and smiling. "You did a remarkable job subbing for Paul Thomson in the drums."

"You were there?" he asked, feeling his jaw had dropped a little.

"I'm _always_ there," she replied, raising an eyebrow.

"I love your fragrance…" August muttered, feeling part of himself had already succumbed to some of the woman's evil spells.

"Well, then take your time to enjoy it, because this one hasn't been released into the market," the woman responded, and the sneer in her lips confirmed she was up to no good, _as usual._ "Now where is my future son-in-law?"

August couldn't help but notice her sneer had grown even more unholy as her eyes darted around the hall.

"I'm looking for him, as well," he replied.

"One of us should check the local convenience store," a man with short brown hair and a very stylish suit showed up from behind Wilhelmina, and his eyes were full of disdain. "I am quite sure he would find the time for some sort of petty crime."

He then turned to look at the woman, and the two of them burst into laughter.

"Oh, Marc, how evil!" she said, gently hitting him in the arm. "I didn't know you could read my mind!"

Wilhelmina then shifted her glance back to August, and every time she raised an eyebrow, his heart would skip a beat.

"Can you tell me why there are no flowers, anywhere I look?" she asked.

August cleared his throat before speaking, now having to bear the weight of two loads of derision as both the woman and her assistant stared at him.

"Apparently, there was a little problem with the wedding planner…" he said.

"Really?" Wilhelmina asked, in a whisper.

"Yes. She's nowhere to be found."

"Why am I not surprised?" she said, tilting her head as she let out a heartless sigh.

"Thank god we got here before Lisa Vanderpump," her frenzied assistant whispered. "Or you would become the latest joke in Beverly Hills."

"Marc, my daughter is getting married to a _nobody_," she said, and her eyes were cold as each poisonous word left her lips. "I'll become a joke anyway."

"Oh," the man clutched at his chest, and a pained look spread across his face. "So true!"

In the meantime, August felt as relevant to that conversation as a fly in a bowl of soup.

"Well… I have no choice but to take this matter into my own hands," she said at last, pulling out her cell phone and handing it to her assistant. "Marc, call Souza. Tell her I need her team to fly in ASAP."

"Is that… another wedding planner?" August muttered, and the two other individuals in the hall finally remembered he still existed.

"Oh, August," she purred, lifting her velvety fingers to his face. "Do you really think I would trust your dear friend Neal Cassidy to come up with anything other than _failure?_"

Her eyes narrowed dangerously, and the message was crystal clear.

"Goodbye, August."

He watched as the woman and her assistant walked away from him, after sending a final scolding glare in his direction.

* * *

Something fishy was going on.

As Neal stood outside Regina Mills' deserted office, he wondered what on earth awaited him. He knew, somehow, that his father had something to do with it.

Whatever it was, the fact remained that his wedding-planner was gone, and that meant no decoration, no flowers, no special ops, no cake, no nothing. He frowned when he remembered that obscenely expensive five-tier cake. How likely was he to get a refund, if it had indeed been his father to take the matter into his own hands?

Neal let out a mirthless laughter. He had better chances of being struck by lightning on that beautiful sunny day than of ever seeing his money again.

"Well…" he muttered. "If I'm not getting a refund, then I'm getting a cake."

He fumbled with the lock, looking over his shoulder and feeling that long-forgotten rush of adrenaline as he broke into the office, and made his way into the lounge, where a series of doors indicated the weddings Mills had been planning.

He quickly located the door that led to his. He shouldn't have been surprised when he opened it, only to find that there was nothing, _absolutely nothing_ inside the room.

And yet, he was, and more than merely surprised. He was furious!

Neal quickly closed the door behind him, and his eyes fell upon another chamber, in which a golden plate displayed the names 'Aurora & Mulan'.

"Tough luck," he snarled, letting all his frustration take over his mind. So what if he was about to meddle into, and possibly ruin, other people's celebration? He couldn't possibly care less.

He wanted a wedding cake, and he would get one!

Again, he fumbled with the lock, feeling his mind was taking him back to his days as an outlaw, when he would break into stores, then run to his bug and kiss Emma Swan until she was out of breath, and until both of them managed to get all that adrenaline off their systems.

Those memories only made him angrier, and he let it all out as he slammed the door open and cursed under his breath. His eyes darted around the chamber like a madman, and he would be royally pissed if the people he was about to rob had decided to save a few bucks and got themselves anything less than a five-tier wedding cake with ribbons and flowers!

"Ha!" he exclaimed, and one would be alarmed with how much his deranged expression made him look an awful lot like Jack Torrance in the peak of his insanity.

There it was, a beautiful crimson cake with pearls and red roses in a wheeled table across from the door. Although it only had four tiers, _and he had paid for five_, that would have to do. He quickly wheeled the table out of the chamber and into his own vacant room, with a victorious smile on his face.

As he closed the door behind him, he realized with a frown he hadn't brought his cell phone with him, and because of that, he was unable to call August to help him wheel the damn cake to the hall where his wedding would take place.

He shrugged. It was not as if he would have to walk more than half a block to get to the man, anyway.

Looking from side to side before stepping out of Regina's office main door, he smoothed his jacket and walked away, barely noticing the pick-up truck that had just pulled over.

In the meantime, Emma Swan had picked up her phone as she turned off the engine and looked to the opposite side of the road in which Neal Cassidy now walked.

She got off her father's vehicle and stood before the entrance to Regina Mills' office, wondering how on earth the former mayor had become a wedding-planner, to begin with.

She shrugged. It was not as if she actually cared. All she really wanted was a wedding cake, and if there was a place to find one… well, that had to be it.

Emma fumbled with the lock, looking over her shoulder and feeling that long-forgotten rush of adrenaline as she broke into the office… except that the lock gave away so easily that it was barely fun.

She made her way into the lounge, and it didn't take long for her eyes to fall upon a silver plate with the names 'Neal Cassidy & Tamara Slater' engraved on it.

"Pfff…" she remarked with disdain, as she turned the doorknob slowly and found out the door was not even locked. "Hmm… How careless of you, _honey._"

She frowned when she realized the room was strangely empty, except for a four-tier cake displayed in all its grandeur in the middle of a wheeled table.

Then, she burst into laughter.

"Funny thing," she muttered, wiping away happy tears after laughter subsided. "The only thing I find is the only thing I need."

She stopped, before wheeling out the cake, and looked at it with envy.

"Four tiers of crimson cake with pearls and roses…" she said. "Neal Cassidy, you really are an idiot, and _I hate you_."

As the words left her lips, she felt her little mischief was more than justified. '_One gets what one deserves,'_ she thought, as she wheeled the cake out of the office with a very pleased grin on her face.

"Emma?"

The male voice behind her made her jump.

"August?" she shrieked. "What are you doing here?"

"I could ask you the same thing!"

The two of them kept staring at each other for a long minute.

"I didn't know Regina Mills was planning your wedding as well," he said, raising an eyebrow.

"Oh, well," Emma felt her ears were turning red. "She isn't. She just… offered a cake."

The man didn't look convinced at all.

"To Henry," she added. "I just came to pick it up."

"She offered Henry a_ wedding cake_?" August asked, crossing his arms.

"Oh, come on, August!" she whimpered, looking around and fearing someone else would catch her red-handed. "I just needed a cake, alright? Just be nice and pretend you didn't see me."

"Emma, you _stole_ a wedding cake?"

"Yes, I did!" she replied, throwing him a very austere look. "So what?"

"Emma…"

The woman, however, had already wheeled the cake to the back of the pickup truck and was now trying to figure out a way to get the cake in.

"You're not going to make it without help," he whispered, shaking his head.

"Says who?"

August's shoulders drooped. If there was a person who managed to be even more stubborn than Baelfire, it was Emma Swan.

"Here," he said, as he jumped into the truck and pulled up the table, with Emma's help.

Standing on the street, the woman now looked terribly ashamed of herself.

"Thanks," she whispered.

August jumped out of the truck, and couldn't help but feel sorry for Emma. Then he felt sorry for Baelfire, who was about to get married to a woman he didn't love, while the woman he _did _love was stealing someone else's wedding cake with a very sad look on her face.

"Well…" she said at last, breaking the silence. "I guess I should get going."

She hurried to the driver's seat and started the engine.

"Emma, I think you should know something…" August said, turning his head to look at Emma.

'_Baelfire loves you. Stop whatever it is you're doing, come with me, and let's end this insanity.'_

Inside his mind, the sentence was perfectly built and ready to go. Emma Swan, however, had already sped away, leaving August and his good intentions behind.


	8. 8 The Healing

_**Disclaimer: OUAT is not mine. Please don't sue. My bank account looks an awful lot like August's!**_

* * *

_**A/N: "The Healing", in which August goes into despair and borrows the line I have been using quite a lot these days: "I can't! This couple is way too complicated! I can't do this anymore!" You will realize the whole thing here (except for August's moment) is way gloomier than the rest of the story, and that is just because I can't stand to see my poor Swan gal suffer that much without giving her the chance to cry until her eyes are sore. I tried to make the healing process funny, but it didn't work, so bear with me for just this bit of angst! She deserves to let all the heartache out, the poor thing! I promise humor will be back in Chapter 9!**_

* * *

**_Chapter 8: The Healing_**

When Emma returned home, she found her whole family, including her fiancé, waiting for her.

"Finally…" her father muttered. "Let's go, Henry."

"Hey, wait a minute!" she exclaimed. "Where are you going?"

"We are going to get Mother Superior," David replied, without looking at her daughter's eyes.

"Is that really necessary?" Emma asked, raising an eyebrow. "The Convent is two blocks away from the wedding hall."

"Courtesy, Emma, courtesy," David mumbled in return, and his eyes met Archie's across the room. The other man simply nodded, realizing it was time to get their plan in motion.

Emma shrugged, choosing to ignore her innate bullshit detector that had started buzzing rather loudly.

"Emma, can we have a word?" Archie said, as soon as Henry and Charming left the house.

"Sure," she said, taking a seat next to him in the couch.

"Snow, do you mind?" he asked, quietly. "This is not going to be pretty."

Snow cast a pained look towards her daughter, and left to the kitchen.

"What…" Emma frowned, suddenly realizing she didn't like the tone of Archie's voice. "What is going on?"

"Emma…" he said, adjusting his glasses. "Have you ever heard of the five stages of grief?"

"I might have," she replied, clenching her jaw. "Why?"

"When Henry's father left you eleven years ago…"

"Oh no, Archie," she whimpered, feeling her stomach flutter. "Please don't do that."

"That can be considered a catastrophic personal loss, so the model applies…" he continued, nevertheless.

"Please don't…"

"Now, although there is no specific order to the stages one may experience, commonly the first one is denial, in which you build up walls and refuse to acknowledge your own pain…"

Emma shook her head, not really wanting to hear any of it.

"Then, people usually become angry, and then comes bargaining. Do you know what bargaining is, Emma?"

She raised her tear-filled eyes to Archie.

"It's pretty much making promises in order to escape the inescapable. Something like, '_I know I won't find him anyway, but what if I go to Tallahassee and wait?'_"

Emma covered her mouth, remembering the day when she told Archie her story, and feeling he had just plucked her heart out of her chest with those words.

"After that, and again, remember there is no specific order, so one might experience it straight from the beginning," Archie continued, bravely ignoring the woman sobbing by his side. He might have gotten his PhD from a curse, but he was still a psychiatrist, after all! "There is depression. It's when the truth begins to sink in, and it hurts."

By now, Emma could barely hear the man's words. Her head was pounding out of control, and so was her shredded heart.

"Emma, I am absolutely sure that he has gone through the same pain that you have, but you know what the difference is?" he paused, and for a moment Emma held her breath, knowing that the worst was still to come. "Out of the two of you, he is the only one who made it to the stage of acceptance."

Emma Swan let out a strangled howl before drowning in tears.

"He accepted the end of your relationship, and this is why he is getting married today."

She wished the man would stop. Her heart was literally breaking, and she had heard somewhere in the past that people could die of that. They really could, and now she knew why. She could barely breathe without feeling knives cutting through her lungs.

"Whereas you, Emma… You are still waiting for him in that parking lot, eleven years ago."

_That was it._

She was dying, and now she wanted to, she really did.

Her mouth hung open as a silent cry left her throat, and her mind drew a strange blank, as if those final words had not only touched a nerve, but damaged it for life.

She felt Archie wrap his arms around her before he spoke again.

"You need to let go."

He then pulled away, and soon after that, handed her a cell phone.

_Hers._ With Neal's number on its screen.

"Talk to him," Archie said.

"What?" she whispered, finding it hard to speak with her stuffed nose and all.

"You can do it."

"No…" she whimpered, as more tears ran down her face.

"You need to get closure, Emma."

* * *

August was nowhere to be found, Neal noticed, after going around the wedding hall for the millionth time. Tamara's mother, however, seemed to be everywhere he looked, and so he did the only acceptable thing to do under such circumstances.

He hid behind a pillar, and waited until the woman walked past him.

He let out a relieved sigh when her poisonous eyes now inspected another room, far from where he was. Then his phone buzzed, and when he saw the incoming call, his heart skipped a beat.

"Emma?" he almost screamed, as he answered the call with trembling fingers.

* * *

More tears ran down her face when she heard him say her name, and before she let out another audible groan, she pressed the 'End Call' button.

"I don't want to say goodbye to him, Archie…" she howled, letting her head fall onto her hands.

"You're not saying goodbye to him, Emma," Archie said, rubbing her back as she sobbed. "You're saying goodbye to the past."

Emma shook her head. What was the difference, anyway? Her past with Neal was all she had; his present belonged to someone else!

"It will always be a part of you, but you need to start living in the present."

Maybe. _But she didn't want to._

"It's time to face reality, Emma," Archie whispered, once again giving her the phone, which was now buzzing as _Neal _called _her_. "Talk to him."

Emma rubbed her temples, and tried to get her act together as Archie handed her a pack ok Kleenex and a glass of water. Damn the man for knowing she would be a wreck after that little therapy session!

She took a long, deep breath as she took the phone in her hands.

* * *

He felt as if someone was crushing his heart.

"Please, answer," he whispered, as he grabbed a handful of his own hair and walked up and down the hall. "Please, Emma…"

"Neal?"

Her hoarse voice made his own catch at his throat. She had been crying, he could tell.

"Emma?" he muttered. "What happened?"

There was nothing but silence on the other side of the line.

"Emma, please talk to me," he said, closing his eyes as his mouth went dry.

"I just want to say…" he heard her whisper. "That I hope you are very happy with Tamara."

His felt his throat had tightened. For some reason, that was not what he was expecting to hear.

"Thanks," he replied, meekly.

On the other side of the line, there was silence, and a sob.

* * *

Emma Swan quickly pressed the 'End Call' button, and once again burst into tears as she held the phone to her forehead.

"Oh, what am I saying?" she bawled. "I don't! I want you to be happy with me!" her sobs made her pause. "I loved you so much! Oh, Neal! Why did you give up on us?" more tears ran down her face, and she was pretty much choking when she continued. "I hate you_! I hate you!_" she yelled. "I… I love you!" she then took another Kleenex and blew her nose, but still holding the phone. "Just… be happy. Maybe one day we'll be happy again. I mean, _friends_ again! Friends!" the tears subsided for a moment. " I wish it had worked. Us. Goodbye, Neal," she sniffed, and her voice was barely a whisper. "I'll miss you. I… I kind of miss you already. Goodbye."

She then let the phone fall onto the couch and burst into tears again.

"That is it, Emma," Archie whispered, as he once again pulled her into a hug. "Let it all out."

He then reached out for the phone, and raised his eyebrows, pressing the 'End Call' button again, and then again, and then on the fourth time the stubborn frozen button finally heeded its command.

* * *

"Baelfire!" August exclaimed, after finding his friend sitting on the floor, with his back against a pillar, his arms hanging limply to his sides. "What happened?"

The man's face was stained with tears, and his eyes were vacant. His cell phone was nearly falling from his hand, and when August grabbed it, he made sure to check the recent calls menu to at least try and understand what was going on.

His eyes went wide when he saw that Baelfire had just spent the last eleven minutes on the phone with none other than Emma Swan.

"Oh, Goodness," he muttered, and in front of him, Neal shuddered. "Baelfire… Let's just get the hell out of here."

He helped his friend to his feet, and slowly guided him towards the exit.

"What are you doing?" he heard a despondent Baelfire ask.

"What do you think?" August replied. "I'm taking you to the woman you love."

Next to him, Baelfire stopped.

"I can't walk out on Tamara," he muttered, as tears still ran down his face.

"What?" August yelled. "Look at you! You are a mess, and that's because of eleven minutes on the phone with Emma Swan!"

"You don't understand!" Neal yelled back. "I need her!"

"Of course you do!" August snapped back. "And Emma needs you too!"

"I'm talking about Tamara!" he heard his friend blurt out. "I need _her_!"

August felt his jaw drop to the floor as he stared into his friend's confused eyes. He shook his head, still unable to believe his ears as Baelfire walked back into the wedding hall.

* * *

"What do you mean, we have a problem?" David barked, as Archie explained that their plan of giving Emma the "shock" therapy hadn't exactly worked out the way they had expected.

"You see, this is a perfect psychological example…"

"Oh please, Archie, not now!" he snapped. "What is the situation?"

"Well… she says she is feeling fine and all, but she still wants to get married."

"I don't believe this…" David muttered, as he drove around with the Blue Fairy and Henry.

"Charming, driving and talking on the phone is not a very prudent idea," she said, quietly.

David quickly looked at her and nodded in agreement, pulling over.

"I still don't understand what you were trying to accomplish, Archie" he said, turning off the engine with a sigh.

"Charming, your daughter has a lot of emotional baggage. She will never be happy until she comes to terms with her past. I honestly think the outcome was positive, overall."

"Well… If you say so…" David whispered. "Anyway, make sure you hold down the fort, we have Mother Superior."

He then hung up, and started the engine for another ride around town.

"I am sorry to remind you, Charming, but I am supposed to be celebrating your daughter's wedding in less than five minutes."

"Oh, I know," he said, looking at Mother Superior with a grin. "It's just that Archie called to say… _she's not ready yet._"

* * *

August was absolutely devastated.

He had gone outside and was now sitting on the sidewalk, hoping to become a huge, wooden puppet-man again. He had had enough of those mundane feelings! Bring him the painful joints and termite-repellent moisturizer, he didn't care anymore!

He had failed as a friend and as a guardian angel! He didn't have a job! He had 57 cents in his bank account! He was still single and Lisa Vanderpump had just walked past him as if he was some sort of invisible insect!

He didn't deserve to live.

He looked at the half empty bottle of Moët & Chandon he had stolen from the cargo that had just landed on the wedding hall, as Wilhelmina Slater orchestrated a multimillion dollar miracle in the place, and ignored the looks of all the trendy guests that slowly arrived for the wedding.

Down the road ahead, a pickup truck drove past him, and then stopped.

August watched as it slowly reversed, and the face of the Blue Fairy showed up in front of him behind one of its windows.

"You're fast, aren't you?" he muttered, slowly standing up to embrace his fate. "Go ahead," he said, opening his arms and closing his eyes. "Do what you have to do! I... I _failed!_ In every possible and imaginable way!"

The woman kept staring at him, with her eyebrows raised.

"We most certainly need to talk about that, Pinocchio..." she finally said. "But I'd rather do it when you're sober."

He blinked when the face of Emma's father showed up over the Blue Fairy's shoulder.

"Any news?" the man asked.

August sniffed, and his shoulders drooped as he spoke.

"I can't! This couple is way too complicated! I can't do this anymore!"

"August, calm down," Charming said, watching the other man's mental breakdown. "Tell me what happened."

"He is getting married, Charming! He said he needs Tamara!" August eyes were wide as he reported the latest unexplainable events in his front. "He loves Emma, and he needs Tamara! I just don't know what to do!"

"August!" Henry screamed from the back seat, and made his way to the window where his grandpa was already fighting the Blue Fairy for space. "I found this in the bug."

He stretched his arm out of the window, and gave August a crumpled little piece of paper.

"What is this?" August asked, looking from Henry to David, and then back to the boy.

"Just make sure it gets to my dad."

"F-Fine..." the man stuttered.

"But don't let him realize you're giving it to him."

"What?"

"Just slip it in his pocket or something."

"How?" August asked, feeling a sudden rush of panic. Neal Cassidy was a former thief; he was the one who usually messed with people's pockets without them realizing it, not the other way round!

In the meantime, David's phone had started ringing.

"Snow?"

"Charming, you need to get to the wedding hall immediately," his wife said, and he realized she was slightly out of breath.

"Hold on, where are you?"

"I'm halfway there, Emma said she just wouldn't wait anymore, so she is just dragging Archie with her, and I'm right behind them."

"And how on earth is she planning to get married without Mother Superior?"

The woman in the pickup truck turned her head to look at Charming, and so did Henry and August.

"She says she will just get whoever is available to celebrate the wedding."

"Oh, you have to be kidding..." David muttered, rubbing his eyes.

"Please hurry, I don't know what to do!"

He hung up, and turned to look at August.

"Look, we have to go," he said, "Give me a call if you hear from Rumplestiltskin. He doesn't answer my calls, and right now... We really need that brain of his to work."

'_Because mine isn't working anymore,'_ he completed, mentally.

As he sped off, he actually realized that would probably end up being one of the most stressful days of his life.

_Oh, forget that._

That was _certainly_ one of the most stressful days of his life, already.

In a matter of minutes, he and his two travel companions had reached the wedding hall, where a very peaceful-looking Emma waited, next to a flustered Archie and an even more desperate-looking Snow.

"Sorry we are late," Mother Superior said, as she approached the couple with a cryptic smile on her lips.

"Oh, that is fine," Emma replied, with an understanding smile that clearly did not belong to her.

The Blue Fairy held the woman's hands in hers before speaking.

"Emma Swan, do you..."

"Yes, I do," Emma quickly replied.

"You do what?" the Blue Fairy asked.

"I do. I take him as my husband," she replied, tilting her head towards Archie.

"That is not what I was going to ask you," Mother Superior answered, with another smile.

"Oh."

"What I was going to say was..." the woman slowly spoke, and her eyes never left Emma's. "Emma Swan, do you realize I'm not here to celebrate your wedding to Archie Hopper?"

"What?" Emma blurted out, quickly taking her hands away.

"Emma, you didn't actually think we would get married _for real_, did you?" said Archie, who was now exchanging a very meaningful look with the Blue Fairy.

Emma looked over her shoulder ready to rant at her parents for their little setup, but changed her mind when she realized the two of them looked like they had just been hit by a truck.

"Because if you did, then I think we would have to move on to prescription medication," Archie completed.

"Archie, what is going on?" she asked, feeling slightly disturbed by the fact her own fiancé had plotted to sabotage their wedding.

"Emma, what do you think?" Mother Superior said, with the usual knowing look on her face. "Archie cares about you. He came to me the first time you mentioned the possibility of marriage, and that was even before you came to me to schedule the ceremony. He knew what you were going through, and thought that all this marriage charade was the only way you found to cope with what is happening in your life, and hence a necessary step for your healing. I agreed to help, and that is the only reason why I am here today."

Emma closed her eyes, feeling incredibly stupid at herself. She let herself fall onto a chair nearby, and felt Archie had pulled a stool to sit by her side.

"I think you're ready to move on now, Emma," he said. "I actually think you realized this wedding would never happen soon after you made that call earlier today, didn't you?"

"Yes..." she whispered, shaking her head.

It was the obvious truth. Whether she admitted it or not, the fact was that the only reason she had dragged Archie into that wedding hall was because she was way too stubborn to change her mind.

She was glad that Archie had realized that as well.

"You know what really doesn't sit well with me, Archie?" she asked quietly. "That he actually moved on, and I didn't."

"Emma…" Archie replied, with a sad smile. "You know that relationships are never 50/50."

"Yes, I do…" she whispered, and her eyes were sad, but _accepting._ "I just never thought that ours would be 100/0… or 98/2. It's no fun to get the short end of the stick."

"You know… maybe things are not what they look like," he said, adjusting his glasses. "Maybe he's way more into you than just the 2% you're giving him credit for."

She let out a smile, although she wasn't exactly happy with those words.

"What I'm about to say is not very romantic, but men don't usually settle down because of the right woman. They settle down because they are finally ready for it," he said, trying not to sound too cruel, but knowing that he would, nevertheless. "Maybe one day he will realize his heart was somewhere else when he married Tamara, and then maybe, one day, you'll meet again."

She lowered her head, letting reality sink in. It was not the best feeling in the world, but she would live.

"And then you two will have a second chance, if that is what it's meant to be."

Emma nodded, reaching out to hold Archie's hand. The corners of her eyes prickled, but maybe that was one of the side effects of that whole crazy healing process.

"But when you do, Emma, and I really want you to promise me that, please don't let your past determine your future. Things went wrong once, but that doesn't mean they will, again. Believe in yourself. And make sure to believe in him, too. Otherwise… you'll be just wasting your time."

"Oh, Archie!" she exclaimed, flinging her arms around him. His words filled her heart with hope, and not exactly hope that she and Neal would be back together.

It was more like hope that _she would finally be able to move on_, just like Neal had.

"And be very, very happy, because you deserve it," he said, as he hugged her back.

"You are awesome, did you know that?"

"Now, now, Emma! Flattery will get you nowhere!"

Then he, Emma and the Blue Fairy laughed heartily.

"Charming..." Snow muttered, as she watched the scene unfolding before her eyes with her mouth half open. "Can you please explain what has just happened?"

"I'm not sure I can..." his husband whispered back, as he took the cell phone out of his pocket. "But I dare say Emma is not getting married, after all."


	9. 9 Lucky

**Disclaimer: The usual: no, OUAT and all those lovely people do not belong to me. "Do you want to?" belongs to Franz Ferdinand; "Tear in your hand", to Tori Amos.**

* * *

**A/N: Sorry for taking so long to update, everyone! Lots of plot bunnies jumping around in my head... Mary! Mary! I'm sorry! I promise I won't keep you waiting this long again! In time: after Neal's line to Tamara, "I can't believe how lucky I am to have met you", I sincerely felt I should pay the man a tribute, hence the title of this chapter. *Bursts into a fit of laughter* Here is Chapter 9, in which Rumple finally remembers who Wilhelmina Slater is and Tamara decides to share a little secret with her family. Much to her bad luck, her ma is less than pleased to hear what her child has been up to, and things slowly but steadily get weirder as August and Neal share another memorable moment of awkwardness and Rumple heads to a showdown that is likely to leave him (and his ego) with a few bruises. **

**PS: Oh, I love it when you leave reviews! So, if you feel like doing it after reading, don't hold back! Make this penniless sitar player a happy person!**

* * *

**_Chapter 9: Lucky_**

Rumplestiltskin strolled down the wedding hall in his rather fancy attire. Brand new Italian shoes, a sharply tailored suit with a subtle black pinstripe. As a matter of fact, he didn't remember choosing those clothes. Wearing them, yes. _Choosing them_, no. He looked at his jacket with a suspicious look. Maybe it had been his son, but then… since when Baelfire gave a damn about all those pompous shenanigans?

He was sick and tired of the young man's latest eccentricities. And at the end of the day, it would be him to be pegged as mad! Now that was a laugh. At least he was not the one acting as if he had just undergone a lobotomy!

He was forced to pause and correct that thought. Lately, both father _and_ son were acting like they had lost their marbles, but at least he had an excuse. He had been poisoned, for Heavens' sake, and he would recover sooner or later.

Now Baelfire… Oh, how he wished he could understand what was going on in his boy's troubled mind!

"Oh, she's a doll, isn't she?" asked a very elegant woman by his side, pointing at Tamara, who had made a quick appearance to greet her guests before the actual ceremony took place, waving at the horde that gathered in the lounge.

_Oh, the joys of celebrity life._

"I've never seen such a sweet girl in my entire life," the woman continued, and by her side, Rumplestiltskin's eyes sparkled.

"Sorry, what did you say?" he asked, with a frown.

"That I've never seen such a sweet girl before."

"No, before that," he hissed, not really minding his manners.

"I said she's a doll."

He smiled triumphantly, as memories miraculously rushed before his eyes, and he finally remembered who Wilhelmina Slater was!

Then, his heart skipped a beat.

"Oh my… _Baelfire!_" he muttered.

Such a low blow… Of course! Now it all made sense! His irrational behavior… his unexplainable tie to that woman… His confused thoughts… the emotional mess he was.

Well… Maybe his son was an emotional mess regardless, but still!

"If you will excuse me," he whispered hurriedly, as he quickly scanned the lounge in the hope of spotting Tamara again.

* * *

August was back into the wedding hall when a text message from Emma's father made his phone buzz.

_'Swan-Hopper in a no-go.'_

"Oh, thank Goodness…" he whispered.

"What?" Neal asked, looking at his best man with a mix of curiosity and tiredness.

"Can you give me a minute?" August asked, before walking away without waiting for the other man's response.

He quickly dialed Rumplestiltskin's number, as he looked around and tried to spot him among the multitude of guests that had gathered in the lounge in the last few minutes.

"Come on, you crazy son of a-"

"Yes?"

"Where _the hell_ are you?"

"Where the hell are _you_?" Rumplestiltskin replied.

"I'm at the main lounge! Where else?"

"Who's that?"

"It's me, August."

"Oh," the other man paused, his little interjection showing his obvious confusion. "Fine, then."

"Who did you think I was?"

"I'm not sure."

"Whatever..." August let out a sigh, wondering if there was anything more suicidal than relying on a delusional man to lead their mission. Luckily, his partial drunkenness was making him much more accepting of certain absurdities. "Where _the hell_ are you?"

"Why do you want to know?"

"Because Emma Swan has walked out of her wedding, but your son is still willing to go on with his!"

There was a moment of silence.

"Where _the hell_ are you?" August asked again, wishing he could strangle Baelfire's father as he spoke.

"I'm trying to find Tamara."

"Have you tried the bride's lounge?"

"I would have, if I knew where it was," Rumplestiltskin snarled back.

"In the basement. Two floors down."

"Fine. Listen, whatever happens, do not let Baelfire anywhere near that woman."

"What woman? Tamara or Wilhelmina?"

Another pause.

"Both. Better be safe than sorry."

"What is going on?" August asked.

"I think he is under a spell."

"No."

"Yes."

"_No!"_

"Oh, shut up! You're making me waste time."

And then, Rumplestiltskin hung up.

_Under a spell?_ Had he heard it right?

August walked back to where Neal was, stuffing his hands in his pockets. Only when his fingers grasped a little piece of paper did he realize he still had another mission to accomplish, other than keep his friend out of harm's way.

* * *

_'Oh when I woke up tonight, I said I… I'm gonna make somebody love me…I'm gonna make somebody love me…'_

Tamara Slater had finally retreated into the bride's lounge, two flights of stairs under the main hall. Makeup artists and masseurs would stop by her chaise-long every now and then, and she would dismiss them with a lazy wave of hand, not really wanting to be bothered.

All she wanted was to bask in the glory of her conquer.

She had triumphed. Neal was hers!

_'And now I know, now I know, now I know… I know that it's you! You're lucky, lucky, you're so lucky!'_

The music blasted from the iPod dock a few inches from where she lay, but she was not really paying attention. In a matter of hours, Neal Cassidy would be her lawful husband and they would move into their ritzy penthouse in Manhattan, leaving that little tacky village behind. Emma Swan would be past. What she would do with the man's father and son was an issue she could think of later.

It was not as if they were that much trouble, anyway.

She chuckled. And then she laughed. And then she laughed louder. _She loved her life_.

She rose to her feet, moving towards the spotless dresser under a lighted mirror, and opened a drawer. There it was, her secret little weapon to guarantee her man would stay in line. To think that all she had needed was a string from his scarf, a drop of her blood and a little vial of magic stuff.

Her cell phone rang, and she looked at the incoming call.

_Lover Boy_

"Hi, sweetie," she said, with a devilish smile.

"Hi, baby," said Neal, on the other side of the line.

"How are you doing?"

"Fine… Nervous," he paused. "Just wanted to hear your voice."

"Oh…" she bit her lip, as the tip of her finger pushed a blue pin further into the doll inside the drawer. "You're so sweet."

"I'm sorry about the mess of the last few days… I know this is not what you signed up for."

"What I signed up for is you, Neal," she purred, trying to sound as honestly touched by his feelings as she could. "I love you."

There was a brief moment of silence that made her raise an eyebrow.

"I can't believe how lucky I am to have met you," he said at last, and she sighed in relief.

At that moment, a soft knock on the door announced the arrival of her mother and her younger sister.

"Gotta go, baby. See you soon," she replied.

"See you."

She put the phone away to look at her mother, as she shooed the bride's entourage away.

"So you want to make yourself useful?" Wilhelmina told a hairdresser who was particularly unhappy about leaving before giving Tamara's hair a final spray of keratin, and her eyes contained a very obvious silent threat. "Tell you what, go get us a bottle of Veuve Clicquot and three glasses. That should do."

"Mom, Nico!" Tamara exclaimed, outstretching her arms towards the two women. "I'm so glad you're here!"

"Well…" Wilhelmina whispered, looking at her daughter's white dress with a raised eyebrow. "That makes one of us."

"Mom…" her younger daughter rolled her eyes. "Don't mind her, Tam. I've just seen your fiancé outside, and he looks _good_, girl!" Nico said, prodding her sister on the ribs. "Is he wearing a Caraceni, by _any_ chance?"

"Oh yeah," Tamara replied. "The suit came straight from Milan this morning."

It was Wilhelmina Slater's turn to roll her eyes. With or without tailor-made apparel, Neal Cassidy was still a _peasant_. Not even Domenico Caraceni himself - might he rest in peace - would be able to change that.

"I see you haven't changed your mind," she muttered, as she graciously sat down on a leather armchair.

"Why would I?" Tamara asked.

"Maybe you would come to your senses," the other woman replied with a shrug, as a terrified hairdresser emerged in the room and handed the trio their champagne. "One can dream."

* * *

_'Caught a ride with the moon… I know I know you well, better than I used to haze all clouded up my mind in the daze of why it could've never been… so you say and I say, you know you're full of wish, and your 'baby baby baby babies'…'_

David let out a sigh. It had to be the twentieth sad song he was dancing to, as Emma clung to his neck.

He felt bad for his daughter. Actually, after the fifth song about heartbreak, he started feeling bad for everyone else in the wedding hall. Even Henry looked depressed.

Archie munched on a chicken wing, and Snow was playing with the smashed potatoes on her plate. There had been no wedding, but there was food. He wondered why Snow had even bothered to cook all that stuff, if she knew, or at least hoped, that there would be no reception, to begin with.

He caught his wife's eyes across the hall, and she let out a smile. Maybe she thought food would comfort everyone, just like he was hoping that dancing with Emma would, somehow, make her feel better about the whole thing.

Every now and then, he would pick up his phone to see if August or Rumplestiltskin had sent him any news on the Baelfire's front. The silence was devastating: it could only mean the man was intent on going through with his wedding. Oh! How he hated Henry's father for having stolen his daughter's heart, then run away with it and thrown it away on a garbage bin full of feels! Not only once, but twice!

He was so absorbed in his own thoughts that he barely realized Henry was now standing by his side.

"May I?" the boy asked.

David and Emma exchanged a surprised look.

"Certainly," David answered with a smile, as Henry prepared to take over as Emma's dancing partner.

"Hey kid," she said, pressing a kiss to the top of his head as he held her hand and wrapped his arm around her waist. _Charming little devil._ No doubt he had Neal's DNA on him. "How are you?"

"Ok," he replied. "And you?"

Emma smiled sadly. There was no point burdening her son with the truth, but she wouldn't lie, either.

"I'm sorry for the last few days…" she said, meaning every word. She had been so busy tending her own wounds that she had barely noticed her selfishness in keeping Henry away from his father. She should have known better than that. Although she and Neal were no longer a couple, that man would always be her son's father – she had no right to screw up their relationship like that. "I mean it, Henry. What I did was wrong…"

Henry raised his eyes to hers, and there was no hurt on his face. Either the boy was a damn good liar, or he was indeed doing a better job keeping his cool than all the rest of the family.

"Can you forgive me?" she asked, lowering herself on one knee to look into his eyes as he nodded. "Do you… do you want to see your dad getting married?" she muttered, feeling every word cut her throat as she voiced them. "If you do, I can ask your grandpa…"

"No," Henry answered. "I'll stay here with you."

"Henry, you don't have to. I'll be fine, really, I will," she said, feeling incredibly grateful for her son's thoughtfulness. Still, she wouldn't allow herself to be selfish again: this was not about her feelings anymore. "If you want to be there for your father, then you should go," as she spoke, she realized it was not only about Henry's feelings, either. "He will be happy to see you."

"I don't want him to get married," the boy replied, looking at his own shoes. "Not to her."

"Henry…"

"I don't like her. There's something… _strange_ about her."

Emma bit her lower lip as she studied Henry's face. Part of her, the one that was still insecure about her being a good mother, felt relieved at his words – the possibility that Tamara would eventually substitute her as a more suitable mother figure now that she would become Neal's wife scared her to no end. Another part of her, a more mature, confident one, could see that the boy was merely clinging to the hope of seeing his parents back together, hence his refusal to see Tamara as an official part of the family.

"Henry, listen," she said, avoiding his eyes as she straightened his tie. He looked so lovely in that suit... "That's just because you don't know her that well yet. And I want you to know that your father and I will always love you, ok, even if…"

She paused. The next few words, _'we are never a couple again'_, got stuck in her throat.

"It's okay, mom," she heard Henry say. "I just… I just wish I could call him. I haven't been able to since the day you flushed my phone down the toilet."

"Oh Henry!" she whispered, shaking her head. The things that boy had endured in the past few days! "Here, use mine."

* * *

Neal Cassidy's mind was far, very far away.

He had never seen so many rich, beautiful, plastic people together in his whole life. Sooner than he imagined, he would see them all again, when Tamara held another fancy party to celebrate their first anniversary. And then, the second. And then, there would be the kids.

_Having kids with Tamara._ Life was really full of surprises. One day, you're spilling coffee onto someone's clothes. The other, you're getting married and thinking about kids.

Well, sort of. His mind was far, _very_ far away.

He was aware, however, of people taking pictures of him. People offering him drinks. People reaching out for a handshake that would never happen, just like his future with the mother of his child would never happen.

He loved Emma Swan, he knew it. And yet, she was out of reach. She was everything he had ever wanted, and everything he could never have.

_He couldn't be with her. _

And then his phone buzzed in his pocket, and when he looked at the flashing display, he felt like banging his head against one of the walls.

_Emma._

Why? _Why?_

He kept staring at his phone feeling his battered heart race. If he heard the woman's voice again, he would do something stupid, although no one would be surprised if he did. Acting like an idiot was all he seemed to be doing those days.

"Emma?"

He had rushed towards the exit to answer it, and when he finally did, there was no one else on the other side of the line.

* * *

"No answer," Henry said, as he handed his mother the phone.

"Don't you want to try again?" Emma asked, feeling sorry for the disappointment on the boy's face.

"Maybe later."

Emma shuffled Henry's hair, wishing that somehow that day wouldn't be as bad to her son as it was being to her. Soon, it would all be over – for now, the best thing they could do was join the others at the table and grab a bite to eat.

* * *

Rumplestiltskin had finally reached the spiral staircase that would lead him to the bride's lounge.

"And so she is hiding in her own dungeon," he muttered, as he started his slow descent. "How very convenient!"

What a wonderful rush of adrenaline was shooting up his veins! After stealing the Dark One's dagger, saving his son from the claws of Wilhelmina Slater and her offspring was likely to be the most exciting and dangerous thing he had ever done!

He felt bold! He felt powerful! He felt he could skip steps to get there faster!

_Except that he actually couldn't. _At least, not with those slippery new Italian shoes on.

As his left foot slipped forward and he crashed down the stairs, there was very little time for him to realize the plus side: at least he would _really_ get there faster. When he finally landed a few feet from the bride's lounge with a loud thud, tears filled his eyes as he felt something sharp pierce one of his buttocks.

He rose to his feet with a considerable amount of effort, reaching behind him to find out he had nearly been impaled by a metal hair clip.

"I'm getting too old for this rubbish," he hissed, as he limped towards the glass door leading to the bride's lounge.

"…and an excellent lover, if you ask me," he could hear Tamara say. "Well, at least he was, until Emma Swan showed up."

"That is the part that I don't understand…"

Rumplestiltskin's eyes went wide when he heard her voice. _The Queen of Dolls_, Wilhelmina Slater. Before her, he used to think the whole voodoo thing was seriously overrated. Then, one day, he found himself being the target of that maniacal woman's wrath, and before he knew he was dancing the Funky Chicken in the middle of a battle against Maleficent.

The woman had nearly torn his limbs off at the occasion.

Luckily for him, the curse of the Dark One had prevailed, so despite the humiliation and the jokes that followed the fatidic episode, he had survived. But his son? If Wilhelmina had indeed made his doll, he was likely to be _dead_ much before he made it to his honeymoon.

"Why would you be interested in a man with a son and an ex-wife?" Wilhelmina asked her daughter, completely unaware of Rumplestiltskin's presence outside the lounge.

"Ex-_girlfriend_."

"It doesn't matter," the woman replied, sipping her champagne. "It is still luggage that you will end up carrying around."

"Emma Swan is not a problem, trust me. The woman is a mess."

"Just like he is."

"Neal is not a mess!" Tamara exclaimed. "He is funny, intelligent, kind… That woman was just a mistake he made when he was young."

"Yes, you keep telling yourself that," Wilhelmina raised an eyebrow at her daughter's silly outburst. "But sooner than you imagine, the next time their son comes up with a family dinner, your husband will come back home with the fly of his pants open and you'll start wondering if the only thing he shared with his _ex-girlfriend_ was an apple tart."

"That is not going to happen," Tamara replied, matching her mother's gaze in intensity… _and threat._

"Really?" Wilhelmina asked with a sneer. "What gives you that much confidence?"

From where he stood, Rumplestiltskin couldn't see what Tamara had taken from the drawer in the dresser as she walked back towards her mother, but he knew something was off. Perhaps it was time to go in.

"Nico," Wilhelmina whispered, and her voice was cold and full of venom. "Lock the door."

The girl and Rumplestiltskin reached the door knob at the same time, but Nico was a millisecond faster. With one soft click, the man was locked outside, and the girl's eyes were wide as she stared at him from behind the glass door.

"Mom?" she whispered.

Wilhelmina Slater, however, was too busy handling Neal's doll to actually listen.

* * *

They were about to reach the groom's room when Neal stopped on his tracks.

"Did you just pinch my butt?" he asked August, casting a very suspicious look towards the man.

"Me?" the other man replied, raising his eyebrows. "Of course not!"

"Well, I felt someone pinching my butt."

"Well, then it must be psychological," August replied.

As if he had nothing else to do other than groping his best friend an hour before his wedding – which he was trying to sabotage, by the way. August kept walking as he shook his head, but behind him, Neal had stumbled to the side, blinking. He seemed to be struggling to focus.

"Hey, are you okay?" August asked.

"I… I don't know," Neal replied, closing his eyes and opening them again with a frown. "Now that was weird. I kind of… my eyes… oh, never mind."

He walked into the room, and a very puzzled August made to follow.

* * *

Wilhelmina had finally withdrawn her fingers from the doll's little eyes.

"Where did you get this?" she hissed, without looking at Tamara.

"I think you know the answer."

When the other woman raised her glance to her daughter, her eyes were nothing but two orbs of fire.

"You went to the Dragon?" Wilhelmina whispered.

"You gave me no-"

Before Tamara could finish her sentence, Wilhelmina had already slapped her so hard she lost balance and stumbled towards the wall.

"Are you out of your mind?" her mother screamed.

"I asked you so many times to teach me," Tamara whined, "and you never did!"

"No," Wilhelmina hissed, pushing the other woman against the wall with all her might. "And this is exactly why, because you were just not ready!"

"Why?"

"Because magic _always comes with a price_, you stupid spoiled girl!" Wilhelmina spat out, and Rumplestiltskin stared in awe as her face seemed to transform when she reached the peak of her fury. "If you are to use it, you might at least use it well, instead of playing with it to get into a random nobody's pants!"

He needed to go into that room. What a time to struggle with his powers! He fumbled with the doorknob, after he found himself unable to use magic to unlock it, and Nico kept staring at him without really knowing what to do.

"Mom?" she muttered again. "There is someone here!"

"Why are you so mad?" Tamara yelled.

"You're my daughter!" Wilhelmina yelled back. "You will inherit everything! But if I teach you what I know, then you will have to choose your battles, or you will be always on your knees, just like you are now! _For a man with no future!_ For a man who has _nothing_ to offer you. I do not tolerate weakness, Tamara, not in my family."

"He is not a nobody, he is Rumplestiltskin's son!"

"Oh, big deal!" the other woman snorted. "The man himself is nothing but a has-been magician. A Mandrake in the world of Fairytales! His son? Not even _that_!"

"Let me in!" Rumplestiltskin snarled, eyeing Nico with nothing but contempt.

"Mom!" it was Nico's turn to scream.

He saw Wilhelmina whip her head towards the door, and a second later it burst open and he was sent flying into the room.

* * *

There was something wrong going on.

Neal leaned against one of the walls inside the groom's room, feeling it swaying around him. He felt as if his whole body was being squeezed and shaken and then tossed around and squeezed again.

It had to be his nerves trying to run away with him. There was no other logical explanation.

August watched the man grow pale by his side, and his mind was torn between his two duties as a friend. The first one was to make sure the man was fine, which he obviously wasn't. The second one, and probably the most urgent, given the circumstances, was to slip the piece of paper Henry had given him into Baelfire's pocket.

He had to be quick.

_'Just take it slowly… He's not feeling well, he's not even going to notice…'_ he thought to himself, as he quietly approached the other man and reached for his pocket.

"What are you doing?" he heard Baelfire whisper, with his head still pressed against his arm.

August took a step back, with his eyes wide in shock. Damn those thieves and their sixth sense! For crying out loud, he hadn't even touched the man's pocket!

"N-nothing," August stuttered. That little prank was turning out to be more difficult than he had imagined.

He had to think of something else. _Fast._

"August?" Baelfire had turned his head to look at him with a frown. "What is going on?"

Think. _Think._ THINK!

"Uh…I…Uh… Well…"

August knew he was running out of time. He absolutely hated what he was about to do, but he couldn't think of anything else that would sweep the man in front of him off his feet. If he really wanted his hand into that pocket, he would have to _go for the win_.

Even if that meant ruining his reputation for once and for all.

"Do you… do you remember that night," he muttered, trying not to wince at his own words, "when I kissed you?"

Neal rolled his eyes and let out a sigh.

"August, come on…" he whispered, rubbing his eyes. "Please, don't make me remember that night."

"Well," the other man said, taking a long, deep breath. "I just thought you should know I… I really enjoyed it."

As he looked at August with his mouth half-open, Neal felt he needed that day to end, super-fast. But the day didn't end fast enough, and before he knew August's mouth was all over his again, and this time _his mouth was open_, for all the fucking fucks in this world and the next!

_'Think of Ruby! Think of Regina Mills! Think of anyone else! Ignore the stubble! Just keep kissing!'_ August's mind kept yelling words of encouragement when Neal's arms grabbed his and tried to push him away.

In the battle, he had finally managed to get his hand into the man's pocket, and his fingers wrapped around another piece of paper, which he hoped was his wedding vows. It was not as if he could actually stop what he was doing and check, anyway, so he blindly replaced it with Henry's paper, and this time, Neal didn't seem to have noticed anything weird happening around his waist.

He seemed to be busy enough freaking out with what was happening above his neck.

* * *

"I _love_ him!"

"No, you don't, Tamara! If you made a voodoo doll of him, _you don't_," Wilhelmina said, trying to regain some of her composure. "You want him, you're obsessed with him. And it's fine, those things happen. You want him_? Then have him_. Have him as many times as you'd like. Go for it! But using magic to have him marry you?" she raised an eyebrow, and the look in her fiery eyes was a mixture of disdain and disbelief. "Tamara, _please_. Why buy a whole pig just to get a little sausage?"

"Hey, that is my son you're talking about," Rumplestiltskin intervened, still sprawled against one of the walls after his unexpected arrival at the scene. "No little sausages in this family, no ma'am."

"Oh, Rumplestiltskin…" Wilhelmina whispered, turning away from Tamara to walk in his direction. "Why come here to embarrass yourself?"

"Goodness grief, you're taller than I remember," he muttered, as he struggled to get up, and not for the first time that day.

"Maybe that's because you're shrinking," she replied with a sneer. "I hear that's what happens to the elderly."

"What are you here for, Wilhelmina?" he asked, ignoring her taunt. "If you have a bone to pick with me…"

"I'm not here to take over an insignificant little town and its funny characters," she said. "Who have you got in your pocket? Snow White? Cinderella? _Pinocchio?_"

She chuckled, eyeing him from head to toe.

"I learned the rules of the game, Rumplestiltskin, while you and your circus freaks remained in the past. You think you will be remembered? You won't. This is not a world for fairy tales. This is a world of _reality_. Eternal youth. Fame. Money. Power. Beauty," she hissed, as an evil smile curled her lips. "This is what people want, not True Love or Happy Endings. _No endings._ Nonstop everything. And that is what I have to offer."

"Good for you," he replied, with an equally unpleasant grin. "I'm going to ask you again, _what are you here for?_"

"Have you suffered some sort of brain damage?" she spat out. "Or is this another side effect of aging? _I'm here because my daughter is getting married to your son!_"

Rumplestiltskin couldn't help but chuckle. Judging by the woman's face, she wanted that wedding to happen as much as he did.

"Wilhelmina, we should call a truce, honestly," he said, staring at the woman towering before him. "You might not have realized that, but at the end of the day, we both want the same thing."

"Is that so?" she whispered, with her trademark arched eyebrow.

"Yes. You want my daughter away from your son, and I want your son away from my daughter."

Her eyebrow went even higher up her forehead.

"Or something like that," he muttered.

There was a split moment of silence in which Wilhelmina Slater seemed to consider her options. She looked at the doll in her hand, saw the blue pin Tamara had carefully placed right in the middle of its chest over a round circle of dark crimson – her blood, obviously – and then, she spoke again.

"You see, I'm not such a horrible mother, so here is the deal."

She walked towards the corner where Tamara was.

"Get up, Tamara," she said, still glancing at her daughter with a very visible hint of contempt. "You want this gentleman's son to be your husband?" she nodded towards Rumplestiltskin, who was standing a mere foot from her. "Fair enough. Let's see if he will take you up on the dare, _without magic._"

In one swift motion, she removed the pin from the doll's core, and threw the doll on the fireplace. Tamara gasped, as she watched the replica of her soon-to-be-husband go up in flames.

* * *

When August finally released the other man's arms to put an end to the scariest make-out moment of his life, he realized even scariest could get _scarier_.

He felt Baelfire breathing shallowly against his lips.

"August," he moaned. "I think I'm on fire."

August's eyes shot open when he heard the man's words. And then, he wished he hadn't. In front of him, Baelfire was ripping apart his vest and then his shirt, sending buttons flying everywhere. His jacket had landed somewhere near the door, and soon enough so would his belt.

And his pants. _And everything else_.

"Oh… my… Goodness," he muttered, struggling not to choke on his own embarrassment. _"What have I done?"_

"Help me!" Neal hissed, grabbing August's arms as his red feverish eyes bore into his.

As his hands touched his skin, August heard a sizzling sound that told him Baelfire was not joking. The man was _literally _burning.

And then there was nothing but panic as the two men ran around the room looking for water.

* * *

"My boy!" Rumplestiltskin whimpered, running towards the fireplace with outstretched arms.

"If he takes you as his wife, he's yours. I'll step back, and so will Rumplestiltskin, who will not pull any tricks, I suppose?"

The man was way too busy trying to put out the fire burning the little doll to even bother to reply.

"Even because if he tries anything funny, I can make an even better doll," she hissed, with a spiteful sneer, "and _break_ Neal Cassidy's _neck._ And then his."

Wilhelmina Slater inhaled deeply, before reaching out for her glass of Veuve Clicquot.

"Now, if he walks out, Tamara, your show is over," she said, with a much colder look in her eyes. "We'll leave this town immediately, and let my old foe Rumplestiltskin here rule over this piece of nowhere, while you get your act together and step up to live the future that I have planned for you."

She raised her head, and waited. Come to think of it, Tamara would be an idiot not to agree to her terms. After going to none other than the Dragon, one of the only magical entities who could actually match Wilhelmina in power when it came to voodoo, the young woman should feel very lucky for not paying a steeper price for her betrayal.

"Deal," Tamara muttered, and mother and daughter shook hands.

When they did, the scorched doll Rumplestiltskin was holding disappeared in a cloud of red smoke.

* * *

August had just poured the contents of a punch bowl over his friend's head when, suddenly, it all stopped.

Baelfire stood still in the middle of the room, blinking as the liquid ran down his body.

"What… _the fuck_… is going on?" he asked at last, realizing his clothes were missing, he was dripping wet and that a moment ago he and August had been - against his will, for the record - _snogging_, for the lack of a better word.

He honestly hoped those events were by no means connected.

"Where am I?" Neal asked, as he collected his clothes from the ground and got dressed as fast as he could. Enough of those awkward moments with August! It was not even funny anymore!

"You're… in the groom's room…" August muttered, struggling to think straight after chaos hit him hard behind the neck. "Wedding hall… Tamara?"

"What about Tamara?" asked Neal, zipping his pants up.

"You're getting married… to her," the other man continued, after looking at his watch. "In less than an hour, actually."

Neal had picked up his belt, but August's words made him freeze.

"I'm _what?_" he shrieked, and his face was contorted in an expression of bewilderment. "How… _How_ did this happen?"

August couldn't help but chuckle. Honestly, after that day, he was ready to go back to Phuket. Enough of people acting crazy: it was starting to rub off on him.

"That, my friend," he said, as he handed Baelfire his jacket after making sure Henry's paper was stored safely in its pocket, "is what _everyone_ has been asking."

"I smell like fruit punch!" Neal whimpered.

"I apologize for that," August replied. "And for the kiss. Trust me, I'll get to explain it better someday."

Neal felt completely lost as August urged him out of the room.

"Where are we going?" he asked.

"That, my boy…" it was his father who replied, showing up from the far end of the hall with none other than Wilhelmina Slater by his side, "…will depend entirely on what you choose to do."

"The bet is on, old man," she whispered in Rumplestiltskin's ear. "Now make sure you play fair, or _there will be consequence_s."

Then, she cast a disdainful look towards Neal and August, and made her way towards the main lounge.

"Why are you wet?" Rumplestiltskin asked, frowning. "And why do you smell like p-"

"Long story," Neal replied, not really wanting to explain his current state. He didn't know if he would be able to.

"Baelfire," he heard his father speak again. "I just want you to know that if you choose to walk away, we have your back."

Near him, August chuckled.

"What do you mean, if you ch-"

Before the man finished his sentence, Rumplestiltskin had glanced at him with a look that could sour milk, and August felt his voice die in his throat.

_He knew his son._ In those rare moments of blinding lucidity, he could see right past Baelfire's façade. The young man was good at keeping his cool; he was even better at detecting despair. He knew that what burdened his son was more than a cursed doll in Tamara's hands.

"It is your decision, son."


	10. 10 There is a swan in your chest

**Disclaimer: The poem from "Ten things I hate about you" is not mine. Neither is Charming's line to Emma (Someday, you'll be back here…). I stole it from Juno! Credit where it's due! Oh, and no, I do not own Once Upon a Time. If I did, I wouldn't be having canned soup for dinner. #dirt-poor writer**

* * *

**A/N: Thanks for your support, everyone! I loooove it when you review! I actually love it so much that I write even faster! XD Besides, I just couldn't wait to finish writing about Neal's heartbreak. After Chapter 8 ended up being pretyy much all about Emma's feelings, I found it fair to dedicate this one to our beloved troubled thief Nealfire. Angst ahead! Be warned! Humor shall return, so do not give up hope! **

* * *

**_Chapter 10: There is a swan in your chest_**

Neal's eyes shifted from his father's face to August.

He felt like telling both of them to take a hike, then he could go out to hot wire one of the fancy cars parked outside the wedding hall and just drive away. His mind was a mess. His feelings were a mess. His suit was a mess.

And yet, there they were, staring at him, waiting for him to _decide_.

What the hell was there to decide, anyway? As far as he was concerned, Tamara was waiting for him so that they could get married. He had no idea whatsoever what was going on in his mind when he agreed to tie the knot with her, in the first place – he had kind of proposed once, to the mother of his son, in some cheap roadside motel, and after all the heartache that followed, he had sworn to himself never to let anyone in again. He had hung out with Tamara, she was a nice girl, good company, she helped him feel less lonely. True to all. But he couldn't see her as the woman he wanted to spend the rest of his life with. Not now, not ever.

Still, somewhere along the line he had proposed to her, given her a diamond ring and all. Then she was sleeping at his place and leaving her stuff in the basement, but he didn't even remember when or where they had officially become a couple. And then… _then Emma had found him_. That he could remember very clearly. Way too clearly. The day when they were strolling down the streets of Manhattan, talking, just… talking, and he saw her smiling again, after eleven years… So beautiful, so different: she had turned into such a stunning woman.

But then, in his eyes, she had _always _been stunning. He used to love her glasses. And her ponytail. And her girlish smile – the prettiest one he had ever seen.

He remembered once, when they went camping in Tillamook. That was one of the very few little luxuries they could afford, camping. For a few bucks, they would rent a tent, take a decent warm shower, and eat whatever they had with them as they made a fire and looked at the stars. In Cape Lookout, the plus was the view to the ocean. Emma would stay hours just looking at it, as she told him stories of her life, and he listened, in silence. She hadn't had a good life, and in times like those he would catch himself wishing he had met her earlier, so that he could have spared at least some of the suffering she had endured. He would have protected her. He would have given her everything he had, which was not much, but still... And then, his thoughts would be interrupted by a silent tear running down her face, and he would quickly crack some stupid joke about the mosquito bites on her legs, just to stop the tears and see her smile again…

That night, as they roasted their last marshmallows and listened to the waves crashing ahead, she smiled at another of his silly jokes, and he accidentally let it slip that he would only have children with her if she promised that they would have her smile.

She had promised they would, and soon enough the marshmallows were tossed to the side, just like the rest of the world. Just like his nightmares, their heartache, their sad stories.

Years later, now without his partner in crime, he found himself in Tillamook again. Staring at the same waves, even renting the same tent, but knowing that he would never feel the same way he did that night, not after they had parted. He ended up making it a habit to go to Camp Lookout when loneliness hit him hard, because other than the bug, which he no longer had, that was _their place_. Every time he sat there, under a tree, and started a fire as he looked at the ocean, he could truly feel Emma Swan was there with him, smiling as she sat by his side.

It had been like that for many years, until the soothing comfort of her ghost slowly became a torture as the choice of letting her go charged its price, and bitterness and guilt clawed their way into his heart, crushing all the dreams and plans they had made. He started wishing he had done things differently. That he had talked to her before leaving, explained himself. Above all, he wished he had done time instead of her. He had walked out of her life so that she could have the life that she deserved, but in the process he had burdened her with even more bitter memories, as if she needed any more of those. To think that all he had ever wanted was to see her smile… What a crap job he had done.

He had failed her, and every single day of those eleven years had reminded him of that.

And then, that day in Manhattan, when he thought all hope was gone, Emma made her way back into his life. He found out that she had had his son, and that she somehow had managed to keep her promise… Henry _did _remind him of her when he smiled.

But at the end of the day, the boy also reminded him of how cruel life had been to Emma after he left, and he hated himself even more. She had given birth to their child in jail. He wasn't there, by her side, to hold her hand and tell her to breathe. He wasn't there to hear Henry's first words, and neither was she. They both had missed his first steps, his first day at school, and in the end, he couldn't help but feel that it was all his fault. All those extra lines of sadness and sorrow in Emma's story, and in Henry's, and in his, had been the result of _his_ actions.

How could he have imagined that she would wait for him, even after all that pain? How could he have expected to see that spark of hope in her eyes as they approached the car parked a few feet away from them, a minute before Tamara showed up?

He remembered it all, way too clearly: the look in Emma's eyes, and him feeling like crap, again. Emma was back, and for a split second, there had been hope for them. Destiny had given him a second chance, but he had flushed it down the toilet. And then a third, when Emma called him earlier that morning.

He had managed to screw everything up _every single time_.

He let his bottled up emotions wash over him as he went back into the groom's room and trashed it until it was nothing but a pile of rubble. His knuckles were bleeding after he punched the mirror over the dresser, and he looked at the crimson streaks running towards his wrist as angry tears poured down his face.

He had it coming. This time, he had no one to blame but himself. It hadn't been his father and his stupid curse. It hadn't been August either_. It had been him_. _He_ had walked out on the woman he loved. _He_ _had given up._ _He_ had pushed her away.

And now he was about to pay the price for his stupidity.

He closed his eyes, and waited until his heart and mind came to terms with what he was about to do, which took many excruciatingly long minutes. When he finally walked outside to see the other two men, his eyes were cold, and his voice, quiet and hoarse.

"I'm gonna need a shower. A new vest. A shirt," he said, letting his eyes fall upon his bleeding hand. "And maybe some stitches."

"Son?"

"What?"

"What is it going to be?"

"What do you mean, '_what is it going to be'?_"

August watched their little exchange with a look of disbelief in his eyes. From what he had understood so far, after the very long instants of silence that preceded Baelfire going into the groom's room to tear it apart, his friend had come to the conclusion he _should still get married_?

_Nah._ He probably hadn't gotten that right.

"Baelfire, you can't be serious," he said at last.

"Look, consider yourself uninvited," Neal answered, sporting his best I-don't-give-a-fuck look. "Both of you. I don't care. I'm gonna do what I have to."

"You don't _have_ to do anything," August replied.

"Excuse me, but… who _the hell_ are you to give me advice?" Neal was glancing daggers at the other man as he spoke again. "_You_, of all people?"

"I'm just trying to help."

"Don't bother. I don't… I don't need your help."

Before the situation got even worse – if that was remotely possible – Rumplestiltskin took a step forward and stared at his son for a long minute.

"Can I ask you just one thing?" he asked.

"You have one minute."

Neal crossed his arms and tried not to wince as his injured hand rubbed against the fabric of his jacket.

"Why?" he heard his father ask.

"Why what?"

"Why are you getting married to Tamara?"

He chuckled.

"Why wouldn't I?"

"Bae…"

"Fine. You want the truth? The truth is that I don't love her. There. Is that what you wanted to hear? I don't love Tamara. Now I don't, but maybe one day I will. Isn't that what you used to say, when I was a child? That love is hard work? Well, I wanna see where this goes."

"Bae… Not like this, son. A marriage without love-"

"…is what I deserve," he completed. "It's where my choices have led me, and I won't run."

August rubbed his eyes and walked away, but his father remained immobile in front of him, with a knowing look in his eyes that made Neal want to punch him.

"Now…I need a shower, a vest and a shirt, and something to wrap my hand with. If you really wanna help…"

"Fine," Rumplestiltskin replied. "Wait here."

Then, he turned on his heels to catch up with August, who was now at the far end of the hall, shaking his head.

"How do we get out of here without drawing attention?" he asked, as soon as he reached the man.

"Use the kitchen exit," August replied. "What's the plan?"

"The plan is, you stay, try to keep things under control here," he whispered, as his son waited not too far from where they stood. "I'll see what I can do."

"Hey, wait."

He had already turned his back on August when the man grabbed him by the arm, which granted him a rather menacing look in return.

"If you get him a new suit," August whispered, "for the love of all the Olympus, please make sure he takes the _wedding vows_ that are in his pocket," he cast a glance towards Baelfire before continuing. "They are not his real vows, it is something that Henry asked me to give him, without him noticing."

"What?"

"I don't know, I didn't even read it," August whispered in return. "But please, make sure it is in his pocket, you have no idea what I had to do to get it there, in the first place."

"Fine," Rumplestiltskin muttered, looking over his shoulder only to find out his very impatient son with his hands on his hips, staring at him angrily. "Think you can handle Wilhelmina if she comes your way?"

"Why would she?"

"The groom will go missing for some time. So will his father. You just make sure she doesn't get the wrong idea. Tell her you spilled some punch on him, and that we'll be back as soon as he gets changed."

"What the hell is going on?" asked August, all of a sudden feeling his ass was on the line, again. "You haven't even told me what kind of spell Tamara…"

"This," Rumplestiltskin's eyes were ablaze when he hissed. "_This_ is the kind of thing that can get you killed. I don't want to hear a word about spells, do you understand? Keep your mouth shut. There is no spell. _Do you understand?_"

_'No, I don't!'_ August's mind responded.

"I do," he said, feeling somehow relieved when the older man walked away to join his son. Dark One is Dark One. He wasn't about to try his luck anytime soon.

* * *

Minutes later, at Tamara's house, Rumplestiltskin watched as his son entered the room wearing nothing but a towel.

"Wow," Neal said, wrinkling his forehead as he looked at the suit his father had assembled for him. "Black pants, black shirt, black tie, black hankie… Am I heading to a funeral?"

"Most certainly," the older man replied, as he took a seat near the bed.

"What, are you kidding me?"

He raised his head to look at Baelfire's astonished face.

"Are you _really_ planning on staying here as I get dressed?"

"I'm here for moral support," he replied.

"Moral support can wait."

"Son, there is nothing under that towel that I haven't seen… Do I have to remind you, again, of all the diapers…"

"I'll just get changed in the bathroom."

With that, Neal picked up his clothes from the bed and left.

Five minutes later, he was back to get a belt, and Rumplestiltskin couldn't help but notice something dangling from his neck as he buttoned up his shirt.

"Son?"

"What now?" he heard the other man groan.

"There is a _swan _in your chest."

He watched as Baelfire let his eyes fall to the silver pendant with a sad smile on his lips. And then, when he spoke, his voice was quiet and resigned.

"There will always be."

_'But you're still getting married to the wrong woman, ain't you, you stubborn, foolish pinhead!'_ Rumplestiltskin snarled mentally.

He should remain calm. His deal with Wilhelmina was very clear. No interference of any kind, and that included not telling anyone what had happened in the bride's lounge, at least not until after the wedding, it there was to be one.

"You're an idiot," he said, simply.

"I guess it runs in the family."

There was no resentment in Neal's voice, though. Actually, at that point, there wasn't much of anything is his voice. It was better that way.

"Granted."

Rumplestiltskin had to concede he was right. They were both idiots. Oddly enough, even though his boy had grown up in a distant land, all by himself, he seemed to be trailing a lifetime of misfortune and guilt just like his own father had been doing for so long.

He found out he didn't like the irony of that _at all_.

"I hope you don't mind me saying this, but…" he spoke again, trying to dissipate the very gloomy thoughts forming in his head. "You look rather silly with that chain on."

Neal snorted. He should have known that he and his old man had very different ideas as to what 'moral support' meant.

"I honestly think it would look much better on its original owner," Rumplestiltskin concluded.

"Well… its original owner gave it back to me, so I'll do whatever I want with it," Neal whispered as he tucked the pendant inside his shirt. It was not as if anyone would be able to see he was wearing it, to begin with. "As it stands, silly it is."

There was a very tangible cloud of sadness hovering over his son's head as he finished getting dressed, and he suspected he knew what was making him so miserable. Tamara and her dirty tricks were only a term in the complicated algebra equation that accounted for Baelfire's troubled love life. Just like he knew how to recognize a desperate soul when he saw one, he was very familiar with the look in the eyes of a man burdened by regret and self-loathe.

It looked a lot like his own.

"You know, there is another thing that runs in this weird family of ours," Rumplestiltskin said, as he studied his son's face. "We are full of love."

Neal looked at himself in the mirror as he put his jacket on. 'Full of love'. A faint smile tried to curl his lips, but died halfway. Yes, he _was_ full of love. He wished _that_ was enough.

"I suppose…" he muttered, as he sat on the bed, opposite his father. He felt like he could do with some moral support, after all. "You know, she called me this morning," he whispered, staring at his own shoes as he spoke. "Emma."

Rumplestiltskin leaned forward. By the look on his son's face, it hadn't been the most pleasant talk in the history of conversation.

"She wished me luck with Tamara, and then…" Neal paused. "Then she started crying."

There was another pause, in which Neal seemed to be gathering his thoughts, his eyes still low.

"She told me she loved me. That I should be with her instead," he went on. "And I just felt like running to her… leaving... all that wedding… _crap_, behind."

As he listened, Rumplestiltskin nodded, studying every pained feature of his son's face. His eyes were vacant, and there was a shadow in them that made him look much older than he actually was.

"But then… I heard Tamara's voice… inside my head," Neal whispered, as he tried to swallow a gigantic lump in his throat. "And I couldn't. _I didn't_. I stayed. And then… I heard her hang up," he blinked and clenched his jaw, trying to push aside the memory of the day when they had talked in that bar in Manhattan. "I didn't say a word. _She said she loved me _and I said nothing… again."

He let out a chuckle void of any amusement.

"I mean… why? I don't love Tamara."

Rumplestiltskin had to chew on his tongue not to answer that question. If only he could rely on his powers to protect his son from Slater's wrath if he broke their deal! But, as it was, telling his son the truth would mean he wouldn't live long enough to make any good use of it.

"But I stayed," Neal continued. "I… I don't… I don't know what is happening to me. Maybe I… I don't... Maybe… it's not meant to be."

His face was a mixture of confusion and shame when he went on with his tale.

"That day in Manhattan, when Emma looked at me, I knew she was reaching out. It was like, she was hanging from a cliff edge, trying not to fall… waiting for me to pull her up… and I got closer to the edge… smiled at her… and then just stepped on her fingers and watched her fall...

"And this morning… when she called me… and reached out _again_… and I let her down _again_… I just hope she realized… that she knows… it's useless. I don't know why, but I just keep hurting her. I just…"

He stopped talking for a second, and lowered his head. Even though he was obviously trying to hide his face, which by now was probably showing too much of his feelings, Rumplestiltskin could see his son was pouting as he tried to hold back tears.

"Back in the day," Neal continued, "if there was one thing about my life that I really, really liked, was that I could give her some peace of mind… Make her forget all the bad memories, all the bad stuff that had happened to her. But now… every time she looks at me… there is this… pain… and I see that now _I am_ a bad memory. Probably her worst."

When Bae raised his eyes to look at him, there was nothing but sadness in them.

"But I can still give her some peace, I think," he sniffed, and two fortuitous tears escaped his eyes, but he was remarkably quick to wipe them away. "So… I am withdrawing myself from the situation, _from her life_," he whispered. "Call it damage control."

"Oh, Bae!" he reached out for his son's shoulder, feeling that his own chest had filled with sorrow as he listened to the man's account. How sad it was that it had come to this. Baelfire and Emma Swan had been roughed up by life in so many terrible ways, and the two of them still had so many open wounds waiting to heal… It had taken them so many twists of fate for one to make it into each other's life, and so many other unlikely events for them to find each other again…

_This could not be the way their story was supposed to end. _

As a fierce supporter of True Love, he refused to believe it.

"Bae, I…"

"Let's just get this over and done with," Neal interrupted, standing up and quickly heading to the living room.

"Wait!" he heard his father scream from the bedroom. "I haven't even taken a look at your hand yet!"

"No need," Neal yelled back. "I'm fine. It's just a flesh wound."

Truth was that it wasn't, and his knuckles still hurt as hell. But he had wrapped a few bandages around them and that would have to do. He just wanted to leave as fast as humanly possible and bring that day to an end.

Rumplestiltskin rolled his eyes.

"Stubborn kid…In case you still don't know, I wasn't going to use magic to heal you…" he complained quietly, as he reached out for the jacket his son had been wearing and searched its pockets for the paper August had told him about. "Even if I wanted to, I don't think I would remember how to do that…"

When he finally found it, he unfolded it to quickly scan its contents, unable to ignore his curiosity.

"Henry Mills…" he muttered, raising an eyebrow. "You really are an extraordinarily clever kid, aren't you?"

As he folded the paper, a smile spread across his face.

"I guess it runs in the family."

* * *

Snow couldn't help but notice David looked impossibly worried as he poked a green pea with the tip of his fork, staring at his food with a vacant look in his eyes.

Not far from them, Emma and Henry were talking to Archie and laughing, or trying their best to.

"Still no news?" Snow whispered, trying not to draw any attention from her daughter.

"Nothing," he mumbled in return. "No one replies my messages."

"It's not over until it's over, David," she whispered again.

"I know…" he said, grabbing her hand and trying to smile.

Just then, his phone buzzed to announce the arrival of a new message from August.

_'Slater-Cassidy is on.'_

"Oh, come on!" he whispered, frowning as he shook his head.

"What?"

His little outburst hadn't gone unnoticed by Emma, who was now casting a very curious glance towards her father.

"Nothing," he replied, as he stood up. "If you will excuse me for a moment…"

Emma quickly stood up as well, following David and snatching the phone from his hand as he prepared to put it back in his pocket.

"What-"

He whipped his head around, but before he could finish his sentence or even attempt to get his phone back, he saw Emma's eyes darting over the screen.

"What is this?" she asked, looking at her father with an outraged look in her eyes, as she checked his sent items and found a long list of messages to August and Rumplestiltskin. "Have you been plotting to sabotage Neal's wedding?"

"Emma… I.. I…"

"Why …" she said, and her face was a mist of confusion and anger. Did her parents really think they were doing her_ a favor_? What would be the point of Neal not getting married because he had fallen prey to some twisted scheme? It still didn't change the fact that, in the end, he had chosen Tamara over her. "Why would you do this?"

"Emma, don't judge me," David replied, looking thoroughly apologetic as he spoke. "I just… I just think he is making a terrible mistake, and I…" he paused to let out a sigh. "Of all people, I would never pick Rumplestiltskin's son to be the right person for you, Emma. I do think he is trouble, I do think he has some serious issues to work on, but he is the one you love. And I believe he loves you too."

Emma shook her head as she listened to her father. He might have meant well, _but he was wrong._

"You know what I thought when he didn't show up that night I got arrested?"

She had told her parents the very basics of her story with Neal, after the man had showed up in town. However, she might have spared them some details that would help them see what their relationship was really about, so maybe that was the right time to set the record straight.

"I thought, 'I hope he is fine. Something must have happened. He would never leave me behind'," she said. "And when I left jail, I went to the place we had agreed to go to, and waited, for two years. And when he didn't show up, I was worried sick.

"I started fearing the worst. I thought, 'Maybe he's dead. Maybe this is why he never called, or never wrote, or never looked for me.' Then, I remember this day, when I went to the morgue. I just had to, because if he had really died, I would probably be the only person he had to… _claim him_, you know? So there I was, looking at the corpses of all these people I had never met in my life, and then, after a couple of hours, it hit me.

"It hit me that maybe, _maybe_ he was not dead at all. _Maybe_, he had just... left me."

She paused. Although there were no tears in her eyes, the look on her face was haunted, as if she was revisiting a nightmare.

"Now, see how funny things are. I believed he loved me, and I believed it so strongly that I thought he was dead, much before I even considered the possibility of him having walked out on me.

"And even though at that time I started thinking about it, it still sounded ridiculous. I knew him. I knew his feelings for me. I still had a hard time believing he had just given up on us. So, I became a bail bondsperson. I had to make a living, somehow. But also, that was the kind of job that could help me find him.

"But no matter how good I was at finding people, he was better at hiding. I never found him. And after a couple of years, the possibility that he had simply left started taking its toll on me. I guess I changed. I became bitter, angrier… skeptical? And still… until the day Gold dragged me and Henry on his unexpected field trip, I always thought that even if he had left, he would be unhappy without me. Just like I was, without him.

"And then I find him, and he is living in this fancy apartment in Manhattan, and he is _engaged_," she continued, and her voice was nothing but a mere whisper. "And that day, he had the chance to apologize for everything he did to me. But he didn't. Not a word. You know why? Because he never gave a shit about me. Think you and Mary Margaret would have even met him if Henry didn't exist? You wouldn't. He would have turned his back on me again. He's not here because of Gold either, although him getting injured in that occasion triggered a lot of unexpected events.

"Bottom line? Even if that man gave up on his wedding and entered that hall right now, and went down on his knees to beg me to take him back, I wouldn't.

"He left me before. Now, it is_ my turn_. I'm letting him go."

Emma Swan had to applaud herself for delivering such lines without her voice breaking, not even once. She also noticed her eyes were dry, and her closing statement had been nothing short of brilliant.

Now, all she had to do was to replace the man standing in front of her with Neal, change a couple of pronouns, and hope she would be just as successful in making her point.

"Why are you telling me all of this?" David asked, still shocked with what he had just heard. He felt devastated. For the first time, he could actually see how deep those wounds were.

Now he pondered that even if that man gave up on his wedding and entered that hall right now, and went down on his knees to beg his daughter to take him back, he was likely to have his ass kicked by a very angry parent first.

"I'm sorry," Emma said, smiling sadly at her father. "I guess… I just wanted to see if I was capable of saying it… It's probably the first time I do. But you're right, you're not the one who should be listening to all of this."

Without really finding the right words to say, David kept staring at his daughter. For some time, he had wondered why Emma was always so suspicious and standoffish.

He now felt he understood her so much better.

"You know, I think we should start packing all this stuff and head home," Emma said, looking at the food spread across the table and breaking his reverie as she spoke.

"What about the cake?" he asked, pointing to a four-tier cake near them.

"Nah," she replied, shrugging with a little smile. "Doesn't feel right to eat wedding cake when there is no wedding."

David spent another long moment looking into her eyes. No matter what happened, he just wanted her to be happy.

"Someday, you'll be back here, Emma," he whispered, as he squeezed her shoulders with a reassuring smile. _"On your terms."_

Emma had to swallow a lump in her throat as she heard the words, trying not to let sadness take over as she thought of all the dreams that had been stolen from her, so many times in her life. Perhaps she would get married one day, after all. _Perhaps she wouldn't._

Truth was, she was not sure she was ready to allow herself to dream again, not that soon.

* * *

If there was a moment for him to remember his vows, that was it.

And, of course, _he didn't_.

He had finally managed to reach his place in front of the Justice of the Peace, after letting Tamara wait for almost thirty minutes. Now _that_ was a joke: the bride waiting for the groom. It had to be his wedding, of course. Things just couldn't run smoothly.

Either way, what mattered wass that he was by Tamara's side, ready to take her as his wife. He reached out for the wedding vows in his pocket. Thank God Regina Mills was nowhere to be found, because if she were, she would probably be aiming at his throat right now.

He looked at Tamara's loving face, took a long, deep breath, and unfolded the tiny piece of paper, silently thanking his father for handing it to him after he had nearly left it in the pocket of his other jacket.

That was it. The moment of truth.

He didn't even remember what he had written as his vows, and apparently he wouldn't know so soon. Instead, he found himself staring at a crumpled piece of paper that seemed to have been folded and unfolded multiples times, as if it had been read and reread, and then reread again. The flimsy paper seemed to be falling apart, and it was easy to understand why. According to the date on its top right corner, it had been written on a March 23, almost ten years ago.

_'I hate the way you talk to me and the way you cut your hair. I hate the way you drive my car, I hate it when you stare. I hate your big dumb combat boots and the way you read my mind. I hate you so much it makes me sick; it even makes me rhyme….'_

He felt his throat tighten when he realized he knew that handwriting. Near him, someone cleared his throat, and Neal lifted his eyes from the paper to look around, as Tamara eyed him expectantly.

_'I hate the way you're always right, I hate it when you lie. I hate it when you make me laugh, even worse when you make me cry…'_ he realized the handwriting had gotten shaky in the last word, and the ink was blurred in the lines that followed. His eyes prickled at the corners, but he couldn't bring himself to stop reading.

"Oh, look at him! He's on the verge of tears as he reads his vows, the poor thing!' a female voice whispered, a hand clasped around her chest. "How romantic!"

"He can't even bring himself to speak!" the woman next to her replied. "How sweet is that?"

_'I hate it when you're not around, and the fact you didn't call,'_ he had to bite his lip, as images from so many years ago rolled before his eyes again, and he wished it was her standing in front of him… He wished he had never left, that he had been around, that he had called.

_'But mostly I hate the way I don't hate you. Not even close, not even a little bit, not even at all,'_ he read, and then sniffed, feeling his heart trying to burst out of his chest. He was about to fold the paper, when a tinier, crunchier handwriting caught his eyes and he found himself reading a hurried note, in red ink. _'Found this in the bug. I don't think she hates you! Henry.'_

He knew that sooner or later he would no longer be able to hold back his tears. He felt his shoulders droop as he let out a strangled sigh, and a wave of murmurs swept the hall.

"Oh, Neal!" Tamara whispered, putting a hand on her chest, clearly taken aback by how emotional the man was as he read his vows.

"I'm sorry!" he muttered, hugging her as tears fell from his eyes. "I'm so sorry. I… I can't. I… can't."

The whole hall rose to their feet for a standing ovation, and some people were wiping away tears as well.

"You can't say your vows?" she said, "Then don't, just-"

"I can't marry you," he bit his lip again. "I'm so sorry."


	11. 11 When parents take the lead

**A/N: I know! I know! *hides under table* I can't believe I took more than one month to update Tango, especially because this story finale has been drafted since day 1! *winces* Every time I sat down to put the pieces together, other ideas and plot bunnies kept popping up in my mind, and as a result, other fics got updated first, others were created and I am sorry. I really am!**

**Well, then… For those of you who have not given up on me XD, here is what you are going to find in this penultimate chapter of our journey: Charming and Rumple take the lead. Enough of their kids floating around like rudderless ships! Time to exercise their authorities as parents! Kudos to both! Who knows, now, Neal and Emma finally face their lingering feelings for each other?**

* * *

**Chapter 11: When parents take the lead**

David Nolan groaned as he drove down the road, after he and his family had finally packed their belongings and left the wedding hall.

What a stupid, _stupid_ day.

He kept stealing glances at Emma from the rear-view mirror. She was staring out of the window as she hummed some song unknown to him, and was actually the only one in that car who seemed to be taking the whole thing reasonably well. Henry looked like he had just seen a puppy get run over by a truck. Snow looked like _she_ was the puppy who got run over by a truck.

And he… Well, he felt he was the driver of the truck and had just run over a puppy.

What a stupid… _stupid_ day.

_'They are not puppies… They are grown-ups who have made their choices in life. No puppies. Just people,'_ he told himself mentally, hoping to convince himself he was doing the right thing when he ignored the last five incoming calls from Rumplestiltskin. _'It is too late now. We did what we could. Emma does not want to give him a chance. I cannot force her to.'_

_'He walked out,'_ read the incoming message on his cell phone screen.

_'It is too late, Emma does not want him anymore. We are going home. It was not meant to be,'_ he replied in silence, letting out a sigh that no one else seemed to notice.

Another message.

_'CHARMING! PICK UP THE PHONE, YOU BLOODY IDIOT!'_

_'See? That is the kind of grandfather Henry has. One Tiltskin is enough. Emma does not need his son, she can do better.'_

The next message was from August.

_'We are heading to your wedding hall. Wait for us.'_

_'There is no point…'_ his mind continued. _'I won't let him hurt my daughter again! Enough of this! She will find someone else, I'm sure there are lots of decent men…in town.'_

And then, images of Archie Hopper flashed before his eyes.

_'Nah… Not him… You saw what happened.'_

The man's image was replaced by Anton and Leroy.

_'Well… indeed they are very nice people… but honestly, you can't be serious.'_

He let out another sigh. So the nicest men in town weren't exactly husband material. So what? Maybe there were other options and he was just not able to come up with any.

_'Let's see… Who else?'_

He tried to remember what the rest of the male population of Storybrooke consisted of.

_'Jefferson? Hmm… Could work. He helped once. Maybe you can get over the fact he is… uh… mentally instable? And that he tried to kill your daughter and wife once?'_

He clutched the steering wheel and made a face when he remembered that minor detail.

_'Nah. Maybe not. Let's keep searching…'_

When the image of Whale flashed before his eyes, he felt like vomiting.

"Aw, hell no!" he muttered, and Snow turned her head to look at him.

"Never mind…" he whispered. "Just thinking out loud. Ignore me."

_'Maybe she should stay single. She has Henry. She has us. No big deal.'_

He shrugged, and his face showed nothing but resignation. Maybe it was better that way.

_'Indeed. A single Emma Swan it is.'_

His mind had finally settled on it, and David let out a smile.

_'Surely Hook will be delighted with this resolution… A single, broken-hearted Emma Swan… his dreams come true.'_

He momentarily lost his grip on the steering wheel, and all the other Charmings in the car woke up from their own little reveries when the pick-up truck swerved to the right.

"Whoa!" exclaimed Henry.

"Charming!" said Snow.

"What the hell?" Emma blurted out.

"I'm sorry!" Charming replied, deeply disturbed by the memories clogging his mind. "I'm sorry!"

_ 'He lent his shoulder for her to cry on once…'_ his mind whispered into his ear. _'And I'm sure you remember what happened...'_

He was back at the sheriff's station… A disgruntled pirate smelling of rum and tequila was jeering at him as he took notes…

_'If I'm injured? Aye, use your deadlights, matey! See the hickey on me neck?'_ Charming heard Hook's words in his head, his mind making sure to add an extra layer of pirate lingo to his speech. _'Me proud beauty Swan made me Roger very Jolly tonight…'_

Oh, the hatred! How he had felt like punching that saucy smile off the man's face until he no longer had teeth!

_'Press charges? Sink me! Only thing I regret… is that me beauty Swan could've waited til I fired me cannon through her porthole before she left…'_

And now he, her own father, was driving Emma back home, away from the man she loved, knowing that sooner or later she would have the brilliant idea of heading to a pub again… and he… that… _that man_ would bid his timing… hiding behind a shot of tequila or, worst case scenario, a bottle of rum… waiting… until her judgment failed her again and he could sink his claws on her…

He saw his daughter, still dressed in her beautiful white suit, swaying with a glass in her hands, walking towards Hook…

'Prepare to be boarded, Swan,' the pirate whispered, licking his lips.

"NOOO!" David screamed, suddenly turning the car around and making Emma and Snow bump their heads against their windows. Henry simply slid on the seat towards his mother with an amused look on his face.

"Charming!" Snow yelped. "What are you doing?"

"I am making an executive decision here!" he yelled, his eyes darting from the rear-view-mirror to the road as he sped back to the wedding hall. "And I don't care what you have to say, Emma!"

"What?" Emma answered, looking profoundly distraught. "What are you talking about?"

"Rumplestiltskin's son did not get married. He walked out. He still loves you!"

He realized Emma's lips trembled a second before she put up the angriest face he had ever seen.

"And yes, I am taking you to where he is so that you two sort this thing out before hell is unleashed upon all of us!" he said, before his daughter had the chance to argue.

"Hell?" Emma asked with a confused frown. "What hell? What are you talking about?"

"Trust me, Emma, I've seen the future, and it's not pretty!"

The other three Charmings in the car exchanged very confused looks, but David paid no mind to any of them. He was far too busy trying to erase the thought of Hook and Emma… _hooking up_ inside his head.

* * *

"What the hell is this?" Neal yelled, as flashes of light nearly blinded him as he tried to get out of the wedding hall as fast as humanly possible.

"Paparazzi!" August replied, hurrying him out. "Cover your face, cover your face!"

Neal looked even more confused at August's instructions, but there was very little time for explanations.

"Wait for me!" someone screamed behind them.

"Papa!" he yelled, covering his face with his jacket and turning his head around to locate his father, who was struggling to catch up with them amidst the tumultuous crowd.

"I swear, Bae, if you ever make me go through this again…" Rumplestiltskin spat out, blinking as another photographer caught a picture of him as he rubbed his injured derriere.

"Why are you limping again?" Neal asked, grabbing the man's arm and hurrying him out of the hall. "I thought it had stopped!"

"Long story," his old man replied, slightly out of breath as the three of them finally reached the street and broke into a run for their lives.

"There, hide!" screamed August, pointing at an alley.

And so, they took a left turn and waited, crouching next to garbage bins, until the crowd of maddened photographers and columnists rushed past their hiding spot.

"My God!" Neal was the first to speak, still trying to catch his breath. "What have I done?"

His father's and August's eyes shot up to him, and both them looked slightly alarmed.

"What have I done? I… Tamara… Oh my God!"

August opened his mouth to speak, but Rumplestiltskin was faster.

"Son, let go, it is over now."

"No," Neal looked positively shocked. "I have to go back, I can't."

"For crying out loud, the woman was using magic on you!" Rumplestiltskin finally snarled, when his son threatened to walk back to the wedding hall.

And then he stopped dead on his tracks, and slowly turned his head around.

"She was what?"

"I'm sorry, Bae."

There was not a remote chance in the universe his father could be serious. It was just too absurd, too ironic, too… impossible to be true. No. Definitely not. He had not gone that far in the misery scale running from magic just to have it mess up his life again.

_It couldn't be._

"No. You're… You're lying," Neal faked a smile, trying to look unconcerned as he walked back to where his father was. "Magic? _Magic?_ How would Tamara… Where… _Why?_"

"Bae…" Rumplestiltiskin whispered, rubbing his eyes. The day had been long enough. Surely they could save the explanations for later? "As I said, it is a long story."

"Well, a story that I think I should know, for fuck's sake!"

"Yes, yes, I agree, but not now…"

"Not now? _Not now?" _Neal yelled. Enough was enough. So he thought he could just drop the bomb and walk away?"Look at me! I just walked out of my own wedding! The hell you're waiting for?"

"Bae, really, does it matter?"

"Hell yeah it does!"

Rumplestiltskin let out a sigh. He spent a long minute looking at his son's angered face, and felt like smiling when he realized that even though he had grown up so far away from him, he had inherited another of his most renowned traits: the ability to be incredibly loud when he engaged in a heated argument.

"Son… She was using an ancient spell on you, one that can control people's feelings… and thoughts… and even more than that. Her mother is an old… acquaintance of mine."

"No… No, no, no, no," Neal had covered his ears, and was now walking back and forth with his eyes closed. "Stop, stop!"

When he finally stopped, and opened his eyes to look at his father again, he knew he probably looked like a dog who had just gotten kicked by its owner.

"You're lying."

"I'm not. But trust me, Wilhelmina Slater was not involved. She actually… she was the one who lifted the spell when she found out."

"Lifted the spell?" Neal's gaze shifted to August, but the other man simply shrugged. "What… when did that happen?"

"When you saw us…" Rumplestiltskin started to explain. "When I asked you…"

"No… No."

Neal shook his head again. His father was serious. He knew it. He now realized that it had really happened. And it made sense, somehow: the fact he would always hear Tamara's voice inside his head, the fact he barely remembered how their engagement had taken place, the fact he didn't go meet Emma when he had that last chance, only hours ago.

Still, the fact that his story with Tamara had been nothing but another prank destiny had pulled on him was a hard pill to swallow.

"I don't… I don't believe it."

"Bae…"

"I have to talk to Tamara," he muttered. He now realized that their story had been cursed from the beginning, if not because of her… _methods_, because of his undying love for Emma Swan. Either way, nothing excused the fact he had walked out on that woman in front of hundreds of people. "I have to apologize."

Before he could actually do so, however, he felt his father's fist connect with the back of his neck, and he tumbled to the side, hitting his head on the nearest wall.

"Now you listen to me, Baelfire," Rumplestiltskin snarled, baring his teeth, "because I've had enough."

He really had! The man had fallen down the stairs, landed on a bloody hair clip, gotten his ass kicked by a woman who joked about his height _and _his age, not to mention the part of being chased by a group of lunatics trying to blind him with flashes, and all to stop his son from getting married to the wrong person.

"There is a woman who deserves an apology, and it's not the one who kept your voodoo doll in her dresser," he went on, grabbing his son's arm and turning him around to face him. "Now bite the bullet, and do what is right. _Be a man_."

Neal's eyes had welled up with tears from the throbbing pain in his forehead, and his father's last words only added to the discomfort running through his veins. He pulled his arm free from the other man's grasp, and it was his turn to snarl.

"Jesus, will you stop?" he hissed, rubbing his temples as he stared at his father. "Just… will you stop trying to get me and Emma back together?"

As he spoke, he felt his own chest swell with anger. That was the point that both his father and August were missing: it had never been about Tamara. Whether he was single, engaged, married, a widower, it made no difference. It was not Tamara that stood between him and Emma Swan.

It was their past. It was eleven years of sorrow. Eleven years of bitterness. It was him leaving her. It was him giving up.

"It's _over_!" he yelled.

When he looked around, he saw August was still cowering against a wall in a distant corner, as if he too was reliving that night in Portland eleven years ago. For a moment, he considered walking up to him and beating him to a bloody pulp, but who was he kidding? At the end of the day, screwed up as things were, perhaps that was how they had always been meant to be. The curse had been broken. Emma had found her family, their son, the life she deserved.

He had fulfilled his part in the greater scheme of things, by having a child with the Savior, and then leaving her, so that said son could find her again and destiny could take its course. August, as it seemed, had been a mere cog in the large wheel of fate as well, so why even bother to blame him for how things had happened, anyway?

"Bae…" he heard his father mutter.

"There is nothing to go back to!"

"Why are you-"

"I left her!"

By now, the anger jolting through his veins was slowly dissolving into sorrow… and sadness. He wished the ache on his forehead could trump the emotional pain he was starting to feel, and for a second he considered smashing his head against the wall again.

"Ok?" he whispered, trying to swallow back the tears before they fell from his eyes. "And she went through hell because of that."

He blinked, looking at the ground before continuing.

"And even so, she kept waiting for me… But I didn't. I was… _I didn't._ I… I didn't look for her."

When he raised his eyes to his father again, his mind was tied up in knots. There he was, standing before the man who had screwed up his life in the first place, who had chosen magic over him, who had abandoned him when he was only a boy. He wished he could hate his father. He deserved it. And yet, all he wished for as he talked, was to have his Papa back… to find some comfort now that his world was falling apart.

"There is nothing," he whispered, again looking at the ground. "Nothing left. What can I even tell her?"

"Tell her the truth."

He shook his head.

"Tell her how you feel."

"I can't," he felt tears run down his face as he heard his father's voice. All of a sudden, the whole thing was not about Emma anymore. It was about _him_. About him falling through that portal, about his father opening his grip on his hand. "I wouldn't want me back in her life, if I were… her."

He felt his father slap him again, this time even harder than the first one, and he covered his eyes to hide his tears when the man grabbed his shoulders.

"You… are… not… her!" Rumplestiltskin snarled, slapping his son on the arm with every word. He knew exactly what his son was feeling. Guilt. Massive tons of it. "And she does want you back in her life, because she loves you!"

He waited until the other man's sobbing subsided to go on.

"Son, listen to me. You made a mistake. No, actually, you made a lot of mistakes. Another thing about this family, Bae, is that we all have a knack for making bad decisions. People fail!" as he spoke, he felt his own throat tighten. "That doesn't mean they don't love you! That doesn't mean… Bae, look at me. Son, please…" he saw Bae shake his head, again looking at the ground, and grabbed his arms to force him to look at his face. "You have to forgive yourself. And I know, I know how hard that is…." he paused, wiping his son's tears away as he felt his own eyes welling up. "I know what it is like to live with regret."

For a moment, Neal considered how pathetic the two of them must have looked to a passerby. He was sobbing like a child, and his father was scrunching up his face uselessly to stop the tears from falling.

Who cared, anyway?

He pulled his old man into a bone-breaking hug, letting years of resentment and anger pour out of him.

"Son, I am so sorry…."

"I know…"

"I'm sorry I hurt you, Bae…" he heard his father's stifled voice, and hugged him even tighter. If only he knew how long he had secretly waited for that moment… "I love you so much."

Neal took a long, deep breath and tried to get at least part of his act together.

"I love you too," he whispered.

And then, before any other word could be spoken, they both felt August's arms cover theirs.

"I am so sorry!" the man wailed. "It was all my fault!"

Neal raised his eyebrows at his statement, and when his father turned his head to look at August with nothing but contempt for having his moment with his son so crudely interrupted, he felt like laughing.

"I was the one who told you to leave Emma in the first place!"

Rumplestiltskin rolled his eyes, and slowly disengaged from that mass of arms to glare at the former puppet. Oh yeah. As the Dark One in him finally settled back, he was starting to remember certain things about August W. Booth. Things that would certainly be dealt with, in due course.

Right now, he was more concerned about another matter.

He watched his son as he pushed August away, patting the man's shoulder with a frown.

"Let's just go and… get this over and done with," Rumplestiltskin said at last, reaching for the cell phone that had just buzzed inside his pocket to look at its screen. "I'm hungry… and aching. And we'd better head to where Ms. Swan is waiting for us."

* * *

"David…" Emma's eyes were wide when her father unlocked the front door of the wedding hall from where they had just departed. "What the hell is going on?"

"You know exactly well what is going on, Emma," he muttered, hurrying Snow and Henry inside. "You have to sort this out for once and for all."

"I have already told yo-"

"You love him," he interrupted. "He loves you too."

She opened her mouth to reply, but judging by the look on her father's face, it would be useless to argue.

They both turned their heads around to look at the door when Neal and his two wingmen entered the building.

"Shit," Emma whispered, feeling her heart was about to burst out of her chest.

Rumplestiltskin, however, was the first one to step forward, glaring openly at David.

"Charming," he hissed.

"Gold."

Both men were, apparently, ready for the battle that was likely to ensue, and both sides made it very clear, as they stared at each other, that they would stand by their children no matter what, so that at the end of the day, if they were to pick sides, there would be no mistakes.

They would be at each other's throats.


	12. 12 Who cares about Tallahassee?

**A/N: So this is it, everyone! We have reached the end of yet another journey! I hope you've had fun! I thank you all for your reviews, follows, and reads! It was a lot of fun to write this… I can't possibly say it enough: I love Neal and Emma with all my heart. I think Neal himself is worth a million fics for the simple fact this guy has so much to cope with… and then you put him with a character like Emma Swan, and the least you can get is perfection. Swanthief/Swanfire forever! ****As a little goodbye treat, I am posting the 'Ten Things I Hate About You' backstory as well – the oneshot "More than Enough", so that you guys can see why the two of them seem to be so fond of this film in this story.**

**In time: it is time for Neal and Emma to finally face the ghosts of their past. But, of course, before that, there is a very angry parent that Neal will have to deal with. Poor guy has a full day ahead… And, on a side note: finally, finally, I get to use a line I wrote long ago, when I did some research to find out more about the capital of Florida: ****_there are no beaches in Tallahassee!_**

**Enjoy! And if you find it worth it, leave a note before you go!**

* * *

**Chapter 12: Who cares about Tallahassee?**

"We should head to the back," August whispered, grabbing Rumplestiltskin by the arm, apparently unafraid to try his luck yet again. The older man, as usual, made sure to glare daggers at him hoping that this time, that infernal puppet would finally drop dead.

"You should," Neal added, his eyes finally leaving Emma's to meet his father's gaze.

Breaking free from August's grasp, Rumplestiltskin straightened his jacket, and smugly headed to the back room with the other man following him closely.

When David heard the back door click closed, he needed no more than two seconds to throw a punch that sent Neal flying against the wall.

"David!" Emma exclaimed, torn between shock, pride and the urge to run to Neal to make sure he was fine.

David, however, was barely listening. He slowly walked to where his hopefully-soon-to-be-son-in-law had landed, and pulled him up by the collar.

"Now you listen to me, Baelfire, or Neal Cassidy, or whatever name it is you go by," he hissed, as the other man tried to stop the blood flowing from his nose. "You hurt my daughter, _I _am what you get."

He then released him, although his eyes were still trying to burn a hole past his face when he continued his lecture.

"And if you ever, _ever_ make her suffer again, I am going to make sure you suffer more. Do you understand?"

"Y-Yes, sir," Neal stuttered, still trying to recover from the unexpected attack bestowed upon him by his… almost… _father-in-law?_

"Here."

He looked at the hankie Emma's father was offering, and took it with a grateful nod before using it to stop the blood still spilling from his nostrils.

"Now go and do what you have to do."

After casting a final look at him, and then at his daughter, David excused himself and joined the others in the back room.

Now that encounter had definitely started with a bang.

Neal shook his head, the pain spreading across his face making the dull ache in his forehead, from when his own father had shoved him against a wall, seem like a very distant memory…

He cleared his throat and sniffed, finally putting the handkerchief away to look at Emma.

"Emma, I-"

"Shut up."

"But-"

"SHUT UP!"

He chewed on his tongue, and raised his eyebrows. Better not to argue. As usual, luck didn't seem to be on his side, and only Heavens knew how much his ex actually enjoyed resorting to the "kick-in-the-crotch" technique whenever she felt particularly annoyed.

For now, he could save himself that extra dose of pain.

"You don't get to do the talking this time," she hissed, taking a step forward."Oh no. Not again. Not ever."

"Ok," he whispered, his eyes traveling up and down her figure. He knew it was probably not the wisest thing to do, but he couldn't help but notice how gorgeous he looked in that white suit.

"Ok what?"

"Ok, I won't-"

"I said shut up!"

He bit his lip, his eyebrows going up again.

"Huh. Funny how things are…" she said, slowly walking around him. "You know, I actually get it. You leaving, the curse, my destiny. I thought it was rather distasteful, if you ask me, to leave me without a word and put me through all that shit so that I could meet my parents, 11 years later. But whatever, at least you meant well. That, I can take. "

And then, she stopped, taking another step forward and staring at him, her face mere inches from his.

"What I can't take, Neal, is that when the curse broke, I was here, waiting for something that gave me closure, while you… you were busy getting cozy with your… _fiancée,_" he saw her eye twitch at the last word. "I saw your apartment in Manhattan, you're doing well, ain't you? Life treated you well. I mean, why? After everything I went through, again I got the short end of the stick, _while you moved on with your life?"_

Although she was whispering, her voice had a note of threat and anger that would never go unnoticed, let alone by him, who knew her ways so well. Still, he couldn't hold back a chuckle when she stated, with such contempt and certainty, that he had moved on with his life, when the truth was that he had never actually done so, despite his best, and lousiest, efforts.

"What the fuck are you laughing at?"

"I'm sorry," he said, unable to control his nerves and laughing even harder, although he was really trying to look serious. "It's just-"

"Stop laughing!"

The angrier she got, the more nervous he felt.

"I can't," he chuckled. "I-"

"You know what?" she hissed again, and this time he knew he was in trouble. "Fuck you, Neal."

He instinctively took a step backwards, as if to protect himself from further damage to his face.

However, it was too late. Emma's fingers had already wrapped around a decorative crystal ball near the cake and tossed it in his direction.

"Fuck... _You!_" she cursed again.

"Fuck!" he yelped, his hand immediately going up to his eyebrow, where the silly little thing had given him a cut that, just for a change, started spilling blood all over his face.

_'You have to be joking!'_ he told himself, reaching for the hankie in his pocket and pressing it against his latest injury. He reckoned that his face was probably a mess by now. Swollen eyes from the previous teary moment with his father… a bump to his forehead… another to his nose… and now, a bleeding eyebrow.

"Just stop pretending you care. I… I fucking detest you, I hate your guts, I can't even stand to look at you," she ranted on, her rage blinding her to his obvious pain. "You know, I'm done. I'm done with this."

And then she turned on her heels, and headed to the door.

"Oh, no, you're not going anywhere, Emma!"

He quickly caught up with her, and grabbed her arm before her hand reached the doorknob.

"I stood here listening to your little rant, now it is my turn."

"Your turn? _Your turn?_" as she spoke, her eyes looked like they were about to pop out of her head. "Do you really think you have any right to rant, after everything you've done?"

"I'm here to apologize!"

"Well, a little too late for that, don't you think?"

"Fine! Be angry! You're entitled to!"

"Damn right I am!"

Before his vocal chords snapped, he drew in a deep breath before speaking again.

"But just let me talk."

She was breathing heavily as well, and her chin was trembling with anger.

"You have one minute," she said, crossing her arms.

"Emma… I never, ever wanted to leave you in the first place. But I did. And you went to jail, and I am sorry," he swallowed, trying to keep his eyes on hers despite the urge to look away when she winced. "And I know, I know that 'I am sorry' is never enough. And this is why I'm not here to patch thing up. I don't have that right. I'm here…" he paused, trying to steady his voice, "I'm here to tell you that I am sorry, for everything, and that if you want me to leave, I will."

He watched her tilt her head upwards, and for a moment he thought he saw her lips twitch, as they usually did when she was about to cry. But then it was gone, and her face was blank again. Whatever it was that she was feeling as he spoke, she was holding it back remarkably well.

"We'll talk to Henry, explain the whole thing, and we'll figure something out," he continued, blinking as his voice became lower. "But if you want me to stay, Emma... Just say th-"

"Your time is over," she cut him short, pursing her lips and looking at the ground as she went on. "And you know what? I'm done with you."

"Emma…" It was his turn to wince.

"No! Enough is enough!" she screamed, and the vein in her forehead seemed to swell awfully fast as she engaged in another outburst of rage. "So now you want to be noble? Now you want to be decent? And just throw this shit on me so that I get to decide?"

"I'm just tr-"

"You're a _coward._"

Out of all the injuries that he had suffered that day, that word was the one that seemed to cause the deepest wound.

"What?" he whispered, all color draining from his face.

"You're a freaking coward," she repeated, her eyes filling with tears. "You were a coward back then, you're being a coward now."

"I am not a coward," he whispered, with a frown.

He had hurt her. He knew that. Could he have done things differently? Probably. But it had taken him all the courage he had to give up everything he had so that she could fulfill her destiny. If he had been a coward, he would have simply shrugged at August, and moved on with their lives. They would be gladly living in Tallahassee now, with maybe two or three other kids. With a job, a house of their own, a life. Then his father would have never found him, and he wouldn't have had eleven shitty years of his life eaten by regret.

He had done wrong by her, and now he knew it. But he was _not _a coward.

"Yes, you are," she said, wiping away her tears as she shook her head. "You are, Neal."

"_I am not_ a coward!" he shrieked.

"Don't yell at me!"

"Don't point your damn finger at my face!"

Inside the back room, a collective whimper could be heard when Neal and Emma started screaming again.

"Here we go…" muttered August, walking away from the door to join the others standing by a nearby table.

"Why does your son keep yelling at my daughter?" David snarled, his eyes casting a dirty look towards Rumplestiltskin.

"Why does _your daughter_ keep yelling at _my son_?"

"And you still ask?"

"He came here to apologize!"

"The least he can do, after everything he put Emma through!"

"That _he_ put Emma through?" Rumplestiltskin had to snort. So now Baelfire was the universe's scapegoat? "What about that idiot over there?" he retorted, pointing an accusing finger at August. "Why does my son have to carry that burden all by himself?"

"Don't try to excuse him for-"

"He did what he had to do! What he _was asked_ to do, again…" Rumplestiltskin went on, flourishing his hands as he ranted about August, "…by _that idiot over there!_"

For a brief moment, David was speechless.

"If anyone failed your daughter, it was _him!_"

August was about to open his mouth to admit his epic failures when David took a step forward.

"August was not the one who got her pregnant!" he whispered in the older man's ear, after making sure Henry was looking away.

"Bae never knew!" Rumplestiltskin hissed back, gritting his teeth.

"She ended up in jail because of him!"

"You just won't let go, will you, Charming?"

"He was going to marry another woman!"

"He was not thinking straight!"

As the two men engaged in a duel of very angry whispers, August approached Snow, who was trying to distract Henry from the surrounding tension.

"Snow, I… Rumplestiltskin is right," he said, looking at Henry with an apologetic smile. "At the end of the day, it was my fault."

"August, please…"

"No, seriously. I failed to take care of Emma when she was a baby…"

Snow swallowed, trying to keep her tranquility despite the bubbling anger inside her.

"Then I ruined her relationship with Henry's father… And left to Phuket…"

As August digressed about his missteps as Emma's guardian angel, he failed to realize Snow's eyes had lost all of its usual kindness. If he had been more attentive, he wouldn't have been so surprised when the woman's hand connected with his cheek with a rather loud smack.

Henry's jaw dropped as he watched the scene. David and Rumplestiltskin completely forgot what they were talking about. All eyes were on Snow.

Or rather, on Snow's hand, which she was now trying to hold away from her body as if it were some kind of monster that had been attached to her wrist.

"Oh my God, August, I am so sorry!" she gasped, with her eyes wide open. "I don't know what has gotten into me!"

"No…" August replied, rubbing his burning cheek with a confused look in his eyes. "I… I deserved that."

"You bet you did," Rumplestiltskin groaned, and in a matter of minutes, he and David were back at the usual bickering.

Outside, Emma took a moment to catch her breath before she continued her heated argument with the father of her child.

"I hate you!"

"No, you don't."

"I fucking hate you!"

"_'Ten things I hate about you'_, Emma?" Neal retorted, taking the crumpled piece of paper from his pocket and shaking it before her eyes. "Really? After all these years?"

For a moment, he felt like calling a truce and just hugging her, even if it was for a brief instant before the argument went on. That was the movie they had been watching when they first kissed. He remembered every single expression on her face as they sat on that park, and every single line of that stupid poem that ended up suiting them so well after everything went downhill that night in Portland.

"You don't hate me," he whispered.

Her lips trembled, and he saw her eyes fill with tears. But then, again, it was all gone, and her walls were back up, higher than ever.

"What makes you think this is about you, you arrogant, cold-hearted, sarcastic son of a-"

"Watch your mouth," he warned, raising his eyebrows.

"Watch your ego!" she hissed.

"At least I have one! Unlike you, who only got engaged to get back at me! What's his name again? _Archie?_"

"Don't you dare bad mouth Archie!"

"Oh please!" he snorted. "Don't be pathetic!"

"_Pathetic_? I'm sorry, at least I'm not the one who bought a four-tier cake with roses and pearls!" she spat out, pointing at the table one foot away from them with a shaky finger. "Tell me again who is pathetic, Neal! By the way, where's your fiancée? Oh, let me guess! You walked out on her too?"

He looked from the cake to her face, and sensed that from that moment on the whole fight would be based on the most stupid of all stupid lines.

"Where she is is none of your business!" he answered, trying to look cool and collected as he spoke. "What are _you_ doing here, shouldn't _you_ be getting married?"

"As if you cared!"

"What happened, beloved Archie stood you up?" he said, crossing his arms. "No, you know what, you're right, I don't care."

"Neither do I!" she replied, clenching her hands into fists. "Oh, and I forgot to tell you, by the way: I sold your stupid bug yesterday."

He licked his lip, and lowered his eyes for a moment so that she couldn't see his face twitch.

"Oh, yeah, and why did you keep it for one decade?"

"I kept the bug because…" she trembled in anger. "Because I was hoping that I could run you over with it if I ever saw you again!

"Yeah, well," he laughed bitterly. "I guess you could do it, if only you knew how to drive stick!"

"Oh no you didn't!" she gasped.

"Call you a bad driver? I did! So what? Sue me!"

"You are a fraud, Cassidy, a liar!"

"A fraud? Wanna know what a fraud is?" he frowned, letting his arms fall to his side. "That granola family dreamcatcher, that is a fraud! It does _nothing _to nightmares!"

"Then why do you keep it in your window?"

_Oh, well._ Now he would have to think on his feet.

"To-to cover a hole in the… window… b-blinds!" he stuttered, feeling less than happy about the meek explanation he had come up with. He didn't even have blinds, for crying out loud! "Do you honestly think it means anything to me?"

"If it doesn't, why did you include it in your will?"

"How do you even…"

"The public notary showed me, idiot! He works at my station!"

Again, he felt she was about to have the upper hand, but he would not surrender.

"Never mind you saw my will, never mind you're in it!" he snarled, taking a step forward. "You know why?"

"Why?" she asked, putting both her hands on her waist.

"Because you'll never get anything!"

And then, he searched his mind for the ultimate silly argument, the one to rule them all, the one that would seal his defeat in that debate.

"I'll… I'll… _live forever_!"

"Good luck with that!" she snorted. "Oh, oh, and so that you know, _there are no beaches in Tallahassee!_"

"Who cares about Tallahassee? We're not going there anyway!"

"I'll go if I want to!"

"Then go!"

By now, all the anger in her face had dissolved, and he knew she was fighting a losing battle. She was finally letting him in again.

"Maybe I will, and you know why?" she asked. "Because…"

"I don't care…"

"_…I don't love you_!" the two of them yelled in unison.

He shook his head, and covered the distance between them to catch her face in his hands.

And then they were kissing, and it was one of those angry kisses, with more teeth and bites than anything else, but he honestly didn't care.

_Neither did she._ The truth was that she had wanted to kiss him ever since that day in Manhattan, and she probably would have, if it hadn't been for that stupid fiancée of his.

"I'm still angry," she moaned into his mouth, with her eyes still closed.

"I know."

They kissed again, but this time, there was much less anger in it. Her heart was beating faster, and her entire being felt warmer, happier, thrilled, relieved. Everything was such a mess when he was around, and yet, everything was so… _right_. Her hands clutched the fabric of his jacket as she pulled him closer to her body, unconsciously reacting to the thought that he might pull back, or yet, that _she_ would…

Behind the door to the back room, there was a moment of anxious silence as Henry peeked through the keyhole.

"They are kissing," he whispered, and his words were followed by a general sigh of relief.

David had rested a hand on his grandson's shoulder, and was getting ready to open the door when the boy spoke again.

"No, wait!" he hissed. "Now they're talking again."

"Oh, for Heaven's sake…" Rumplestiltskin groaned, turning on his heels as he walked away from the door.

"I know…" Neal whispered, pressing his still aching forehead against Emma's as his fingers tightened their grip around her waist. "I know I screwed up, Emma…" he said, opening his eyes to look at her face. "I just want you to know that I never, _ever_ stopped loving you."

"Yeah… right."

Her acid response left her lips much faster than she could have expected. She saw he had winced, and that he now had a kind of resigned sadness in his eyes.

"It turns out that I'm just bad at making choices..." he muttered.

Oh, who was she fooling? She knew that man. She could see right through him. She knew he was telling the truth.

"Yeah..." she whispered.

"I just… I…"

"I love you too," she said, before the man in front of him ended up drowning in his own sad thoughts. "But I wish I didn't. Right now, I really… I am so done with you, Neal..."

"I know…"

"You… you put me through hell… and when I thought I had seen it all…" she said, shaking her head with a raised eyebrow as he grabbed her hands, "you… you just pushed the envelope, I mean… The whole thing with Tamara…"

"Emma…" he winced again. "I... please…"

"Seriously now… What happened to her? Why are you even here?"

She watched him intently, as he clenched his jaw and looked over his shoulder towards the back room.

"My father has all the juicy details, but let's just say we broke up over… _fundamental differences_."

"Oh yeah?"

And then, he was looking at her with those puppy eyes, and a smile curled her lips.

"Yeah, you see…" he said, pulling her closer to his body as he spoke. "She saw me as her husband, but I didn't see her as my wife."

"Oh."

"Yup."

"Well, then I guess I can beat you," she replied, resting her hands on his shoulders. "Archie and I broke up because I didn't see him as my husband, and he didn't see me as his wife, either."

He chuckled. For so long he had told himself that the two of them had no chance whatsoever of getting back together, and now it was finally happening. Maybe it would still take time for her to trust him again, but at least she seemed to be willing to try. He could see it in her eyes, and she probably had no idea of the huge weight she was lifting off his shoulders with that smile on her face.

"Wow... You're a tough competitor."

"Yup," she replied, and when she did, she looked just like that girl who had stolen his car in Portland. "No one screws up like I do."

"Hmmm…" he frowned in response. "Funny that you're saying that to the guy who steals watches, then has his girlfriend steal back the watches to save his sorry ass, then lets her take the fall and give birth to their child in jail, and then moves on to live 11 years of a very strange life, gets engaged to a woman he didn't love, spends all the money he will take his entire life to make on a wedding that will never happen, and becomes the babysitter of a lunatic, former scary, now just _scary crazy_, father."

"The last part was not your fault."

"You're right," he agreed. "Just a fitting punishment for all the other things."

He saw her smile again, and all the pain of his multiple injuries disappeared for good. Tomorrow, he would probably look like a car crash, with bruises and bumps and bandages. Probably he was already looking pretty bad, but the way she looked at him always made him feel the most handsome man on earth.

"Well…" she whispered, and her eyes seemed to finally acknowledge his pain as her fingers gently grazed his eyebrow. "Putting things in perspective, I can live with being the runner-up in the screw-up category."

"Will you ever forgive me?"

"For being a mess?"

"Yes."

"I don't know if I should."

"Will you give me a chance to convince you…" he whispered, his lips brushing against her ear as his hands slowly descended to her hips, "… at least?"

Damn that man. Actually, damn her body for responding so fast to that man's advances. Those hands… Oh, no… _Those hands…_

Her eyes had fluttered closed when she felt them go even lower.

"Why would I?" she moaned.

"Why don't I tell you over drinks?"

She gasped when he chuckled, and as he pulled her closer to him, she was relieved to realize her body was not the only one reacting… _quickly_ to their little make out.

"S-Seriously?" she stuttered, opening her eyes again and trying to keep a straight face. "Is that the best thing you can come up with?"

"One of the best," he replied, before pressing his lips to the side of her neck and sending even more shivers down her spine.

"You honestly think you can buy me with a drink?"

"It worked when we first met."

She pushed him away to stare at his face with her eyes wide open.

"I beg your pardon?"

"What?" he asked, biting his lip as he held her gaze. "It did, what can I do?"

"You're unbelievable…"

She pulled him closer again, and her lips caught his in yet another kiss. This time, though, their mouths made love to each other, as they took turns giving in and taking charge of every move. She took her time to taste him as she explored every inch of his body her hands could reach, and he did the same, trying to take it slowly although by now all the nerves in his body were going up in flames.

"They are… kissing again…" Henry whispered to the little crowd behind him, in the back room. "I… I guess…"

"You guess?" Snow asked, with a chuckle. "Henry, what do you mean… you guess?"

"It's just…" the boy continued. "She is taking off his jacket…"

David's eyes went wide, and Rumplestiltskin couldn't have looked more pleased when he smirked. Both Snow and August rushed to the door to urge Henry away from the keyhole, in case his parents were planning to do what everyone thought they were planning to do.

"Glad you came to an agreement," David announced, throwing the door open and stepping outside before… well. Before it was too late. "Now can we all just go home?"

"Oh God!" Emma gasped, clutching Neal's shoulders at the mention of that word. "The bug."

"You wanna do it in the bug?" he whispered, his hands moving up back to her hips before his father-in-law punched him again. "Just like the old days…"

"No!" she replied, looking pale as she pushed him away. "I need to get it back!"

"Oh."

He watched as she pulled her cell phone out of her pocket, and leaned against the table. When his eyes caught David's a mere foot away, he realized the man had a murderous look on his face, and when he glanced down at his lap, he could understand why.

Luckily, he was able to use his jacket to hide the very noticeable bulge in his pants a second before Henry and the others joined them in the lounge.

"Hey buddy!" he exclaimed, grinning widely when his son joined him by the table.

"Ok," Emma muttered, finally dialing the number the buyer of her bug had provided.

Seconds later, Rumplestiltskin felt his phone buzz, and answered it without even looking at the screen.

"Yes?"

"Who is this?" Emma asked.

"I ask that myself. _You _called _me_."

"Wait…" she muttered. "I know that voice!"

She whipped her head around, and saw her father-in-law walking carelessly around with his cell phone in hand.

"Gold?"

"Who is this?" he asked, after stopping dead on his tracks. "Your voice… sounds familiar."

She hung up, and waited 'til he turned around to speak again.

"You bought my car?"

Both Neal and Henry raised their eyebrows at her question.

"What car?" Rumplestiltskin asked, looking puzzled.

"The bug."

"I have no idea what you're talking about."

"Oh, come o-"

"Erm… Mom?"

She turned her head to look at Henry, who now sported a very obvious guilty look on his face.

"Henry?" she asked, raising her eyebrows.

"I bought the bug," he confessed, wincing.

Neal looked delighted, with his mouth half open as he stared at his son, smiling.

"What?" Emma asked, her mouth gaping as well. "Henry… how… _why?_"

"I'm sorry, I… I couldn't let you sell it," he explained. "I used grandpa's credit card."

"_My _credit card?" Rumplestiltskin asked, wondering when on earth he had gotten himself one, to begin with.

"No, my other grandpa's," the boy replied, looking at David and feeling his ears had gone red. "But I couldn't use their contact information, or Emma would know…" he said, turning to look at the older man again. "So I used yours."

Rumplestiltskin raised his eyebrows and nodded with a proud smile after looking from Henry to his son.

"Clever, I have to concede," he said.

"Clever?" David asked. "Henry, you used my credit card to buy… _a car_?"

The boy shrugged, knowing it would be useless to try to defend himself now that the cat was out of the bag.

"Well, no wonder it was declined when I tried to buy gas the other day…" David muttered.

"Maybe we can ask for a refund?" Henry asked, looking at his mother.

Emma simply shook her head, and her gaze met Neal's. They certainly needed to talk to that kid about using other people's credit card without their permission.

Not that they had the best track record in that matter, though…

"Henry, come here," Neal whispered, still smiling as he glanced at his son. He caught the boy's face in his hands, and then raised his eyes to Emma. When he looked back at the boy, he nearly forgot whatever it was that he had planned to say, and simply let himself take in his features, finding so much of him, and so much of her, on his face. "I love you, son."

Henry smiled, and he felt his chest swell with warmth. Yet, that was not what he had planned to say.

"But it is not okay to take other people's things without asking first, ok?"

The boy lowered his eyes for a brief moment, and then raised his glance to his father again.

"He always leaves his credit card out of his wallet on the dining table," he complained. "I resisted, twice! The third time he is just asking to get took."

Neal's eyes looked like they were about to pop out of his head. He slowly turned his head to look at Emma, whose mouth hung open as well, the expression on her face matching his in shock.

"I swear I never said a word," she muttered.

He remained paralyzed as the boy shrugged and walked away, joining his grandparents at a nearby table. Of all things he knew could be genetic… the ability to duplicate a parent's train of thought was definitely not on the list.

"Hey," Snow finally said, a relieved smile on her face as their family finally got back on track. "I know neither of you got married today, but I think that is exactly why we should celebrate," she paused, and spent a particularly long moment looking at her daughter's face. "So how about some cake?"

"Ah… About the cake…" Emma muttered, slightly ashamed of the revelation she was about to make, especially now that their son had just admitted to a minor theft. "It… It is actually Neal's, I… I…" she let her arms fall to her side, and lowered her head. "I stole it."

Henry chuckled, and so did Rumplestiltskin. The Charmings, however, looked confused, and August merely glanced at everyone else with a very sly 'I-knew-it' look on his eyes.

"Hmmm… Emma…"

When she turned to look at Neal, she saw he was scratching his head with his trademark puppy look on.

_She knew exactly what that meant._

"That is not your cake either," she whispered, raising an eyebrow. "I stole a stolen wedding cake?"

A smile curled his lips, and he looked away for a second before speaking again.

"Now how about that drink?"

She had to laugh.

_They were back to the beginning._

As she flung her arms around him, her eyes caught her mother's across the room. To think that not long ago, one of the last things the two women had talked about was how some people were never meant to get their happy endings.

Her eyes quickly travelled to the other faces around her. She saw her son talking to August… Rumplestiltskin and her father still engaged in their legendary bickering, with Snow trying to calm both of them down… and then, she looked at Neal and his smiling face.

The thing about happy endings, she now realized, as he pressed his lips against hers…

_… was that they happened when you least expected._

The End.


End file.
